paging paul to this thread, paul, to this thread please.
Schoenberg, then...
Well, I read his
Harmonielehre (at school) before I listened to any of his music! Actually, I've not really got into Schoenberg - I only properly know the small piano pieces (Opp 11 & 19) which my son plays and I've dabbled with. I've a passing acquaintance with other stuff, of course, but generally I'm more into Berg, starting with the Op 1 Piano Sonata (a marvellous outpouring of late romanticism, which my son used to play at school), and going on through the Lyric Suite (do you know the version with voice in the last movement?), and of course the operas (I saw Wozzeck recently in a production that changed the location to a baked-bean canning factory - weird...
and the singer I'd specially gone to see was ill).
The Rest is Noise I've only dipped into so far, but I enjoy the writing, and there's certainly some good stuff there. But I offer you a different reading challenge:
A Concise History of Western Music by Paul Griffiths. Nothing is omitted - he doesn't even reach the year 1400 until chapter 4, while the end reaches beyond 2000 - and all in barely 300 pages of wonderful writing and beautifully condensed and sequenced thought. I find it particularly good for showing the relationships between all the different strands of development.