Ciphers with musical notes make an interesting genre in cryptography. An overview at Cipherbrain is something I wanted to write myself. After providing some additional sources in a comment there, I remembered my old writing. The following are two additional specimens from Japanese literature.
Jun'ichiro Tanizaki (谷崎潤一郎) (Wikipedia), Momoku Monogatari (盲目物語) (1931) (text)
This is a story of Oichi (Wikipedia), a sister of warlord Oda Nobunaga (Wikipedia) as told by Yaichi, a (probably fictional) blind shamisen player. When Oichi's husband's castle is doomed under siege in 1583, the last banquet is held. Yaichi notices the shamisen tune played by a monk includes repeated unnatural interludes, which convey a secret message for rescue.
It makes use of traditional musical notation for shamisen, whereby tsubo (Wikipedia) (places to be held on the neck of the instrument) are represented by kana syllabary.
Hisashi Inoue (井上ひさし) (Wikipedia), Nise Genshijin (偽原始人) (1976)
This is a story of three kids in the fifth grade. They communicate with interesting ciphers. One of them employs musical notes. A sheet music has two parts, one for consonants and the other for vowels. (Most Japanese syllables consists of one consonant and one vowel.) I think I have an image in some of the boxes stacked in my study, but I cannot locate it now.
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