A primer–rather than a survey–this text offers exceptionally clear, simple explanations of basic theoretical concepts for the post-tonal music of the twentieth century. Emphasizing hands-on contact with the music–through playing, singing, listening, and analyzing–it provides six chapters on theory, each illustrated with musical examples and fully worked-out analyses, all drawn largely from the “classical” pre-war repertoire by Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Bartok, Berg, and Webern.

"Straus takes a paced, methodical, logical approach to each topic. He introduces it in context and — perhaps most significantly of all — uses language that's so transparent that merely to follow his descriptions, explanations and illustrations carefully is to understand each aspect of the theory under consideration."  Mark Sealey, Classical.net