Highlighting connections between 19th-century German music and nationalism, this study focuses on works based on popular, mythologized versions of historical subject-matter, in particular the life of Barbarossa and the Roman legions’ annihilation at the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest. It explores how compositions in many musical genres participated in a project of shaping the nation’s future and how composers such as Max Bruch and Carl Reinecke responded to contemporary notions of gender, landscape and religion.

Blamed by some for breaking up the Beatles, criticized for putting his wife in his band and challenged to live up to his reputation, Paul McCartney was under pressure during the 1970s. This biography reviews his life from the end of the Fab Four to the death of John Lennon, a period that saw the establishment of his hideaway in Kintyre, experimental music and hit records, small gigs and world tours, and numerous drugs busts.

The unique sound of the Hammond organ has had a profound influence on genres such as blues, jazz, soul, funk and rock. This book begins with information on the technology behind the instrument, followed by the story of its greatest players. The final section consists of musical examples illustrating the range of techniques available to the Hammond organist and a selection of short pieces in different performers’ styles; these are all recorded on the accompanying 39-track audio CD.

Orchestra of St. Luke's; Robert Craft

Oxford Camerata; Jeremy Summerly

Royal Scottish National Orchestra; Jun Märkl

Northern Sinfonia; Steuart Bedford

Orchestre National de Lyon; Leonard Slatkin

Cologne Chamber Orchestra; Helmut Müller-Brühl. PB 142pp + 2 CDs

Having stolen the show ahead of a cast of stars in Las Vegas, the 'Godfather of Soul', James Brown, shunned the after-show glad-handing and left; 'Kill 'em and leave,' he remarked to his friend, civil-rights activist Al Sharpton. This biography uses the recollections of people close to Brown, such as Sharpton, to piece together the story of a man who was notoriously secretive and evasive about his private life.

For more than half a century, Mary O’Hara’s voice has delighted audiences across the globe. In this warm and inspiring autobiography, she recalls her childhood in the west of Ireland, the tragic death of her first husband, and her retreat to a nunnery before re-emerging to restart her career to even greater acclaim. Enriched with humorous anecdotes of life on the road, it also recounts her later years as a charity worker with her second husband in Africa.

Anthony Burton’s 20,000-word essay surveys a millennium of British music, illustrating its distinctive features through the pieces assembled on the accompanying pair of CDs. These 47 tracks range from an anonymous motet honouring St Thomas of Canterbury (c.1300), via such composers as Boyce, Bax and Britten, to Colin Matthews’ Pluto, the Renewer, written in 2000 to complement Holst’s The Planets.

Christopher Purves, baritone; Simon Lindley, organ; Huddersfield Choral Society; Leeds Philharmonic Chorus; English Northern Philharmonia; Paul Daniel.

Felicity Lott, soprano; Martyn Hill, tenor; Craig Ogden, guitar; Graham Johnson, piano.

Madeleine Mitchell, violin; Howard Blake, piano; Jack Rothstein, violin; Kenneth Essex, viola; Peter Wilson, cello.

Raphael Wallfisch, cello; Raphael Terroni, piano.

Karina Gauvin, soprano: Matthew Larkin, organ; Choir of St. John's, Elora, Canada; Noel Edison.

Focusing on string players whose performances have been captured on disc, this guide sets acclaimed soloists of today, such as violinist Joshua Bell and cellist Yo-Yo Ma, alongside great performers of the past; each entry includes an appraisal of the player’s style and their recorded legacy. The book comes with four CDs, featuring tracks by 69 artists, which illustrate how string playing and recorded sound developed across the past century.

More than 300 of the 20th century’s greatest conductors are profiled in this alphabetical guide, with brief biographies complemented by lists of each musician’s most significant performances on disc. The accompanying CDs present more than five hours of remastered excerpts from historic recordings by 48 conductors, ranging from Arthur Nikisch’s pioneering 1913 account of Beethoven’s 5th Symphony to Guido Cantelli’s 1954 recording of Debussy’s La Mer.

This compact guide is an informative resource for everyone seeking to discover more about opera. An introduction charting the development of the genre from 1600 to the present is followed by an alphabetical guide to the characters, plots and theatrical history of hundreds of operas from Monteverdi’s Coronation of Poppaea to John Adams’s Nixon in China, composer biographies and a glossary of operatic terms. This expanded second edition includes access to 130 tracks online.

Written in 1871 for the opening of the Cairo opera house, Verdi’s majestic opera dramatizes the forbidden love between Radames, an Egyptian general, and Aida, an Ethiopian slave. Maria Dragoni and Kristjan Johannsson excel as the doomed lovers, while the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland delivers the famous triumphal march with power and panache.

Set in 19th-century Paris, La Bohème centres on the love of the poet Rodolfo and the consumptive seamstress Mimi. With Jonathan Welch and Luba Orgonasova in the lead roles, powerfully supported by the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra, this magnificent recording captures all the tragedy and tenderness of Puccini’s much-loved opera.

Pestover/Meyer Piano Duo.

Sir Thomas Allen, baritone; Ty Jackson, boy soprano;, John Tessier, tenor; Nashville Symphony Chorus; Nashville Symphony Orchestra; Leonard Slatkin

Ida Bieler, violin; Nina Tichman, piano.

John Corigliano: The Red Violin Caprices, Sonata for Violin and Piano.Virgil Thomson: Three Portraits, Five Ladies, Eight Portraits - . Philippe Quint, violin; William Wolfram, piano.

Orion Weiss, piano; Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. JoAnn Falletta.

Music for Clarinet and Strings arranged by Frank Villard.Porgy and Bess Suite, Piano Concerto in F major (excerpt). An American In Paris (excerpt) and Three Preludes.

Martin Outram, viola; Laurence Jackson, Violin; Julian Rolton, piano.

Roberto Cappello, piano: Corale Luca Marenzio; Orchestra Sinfonica di Roma: Francesco La Vecchia

Alexander von Zemlinsky; Lyric Symphony; Alban Berg's Three Pieces from the Lyric Suite arranged for string orchestra. Roman Trekel, baritone. Twyla Robinson, soprano, Houston Symphony, Hans Graf.

CSR Symphony, Polish State Philharmonic and CSSR State Philharmonic orchestras.

Carl Herrin, guitar,

Cello Concerto and Concerto-Rhapsody. Dimitry Yablonsky, Cello, Moscow City Symphony Orchestra. Recorded by Russian State TV and Radio Company, Moscow 2007.

‘A blazingly musical city... Glasgow became a UNESCO City of Music in 2008 thanks to the countless kinds of music that coexist on these streets.’ This volume reflects the diversity of the city and its sounds in 21 richly illustrated essays on the music, history and life of 20 different venues, from the Cathedral to King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, by way of pubs, recording studios, concert halls, ballrooms, the College of Piping and the legendary Apollo.

Jerusalem, God of our fathers, Let us with a gladsome mind: many of our best-loved hymns are based on the words of famous British poets such as Cowper, Dryden, Kipling and Blake (whom Sir John Betjeman calls ‘our greatest religious poet’). This colourfully illustrated anthology presents the texts of 65 hymns and seven carols, with an appendix highlighting where these familiar versions differ from the original poems. Based on Hymns as Poetry (1980).

Sir Harrison Birtwistle is one of Britain’s greatest contemporary composers, but has usually been reluctant to discuss his music. In 2013, as he approached the age of 80, he agreed to take part in this series of conversations, which happened mostly at his kitchen table, over a period of six months. They offer insights into his career and compositional process, his thoughts on the composers whom he most admires and his non-musical interests, such as cricket, nature and his family.

Ramzi Hussein Aburedwan was a child in a Palestinian refugee camp during the First Intifada (1987–93) and now uses music to help transform young people’s lives amid the military checkpoints of the war-torn territories. This book tells his story, describing how he first learned to play the viola, then founded a school and inspired musicians from around the world to join him in a project which Daniel Barenboim says has shown Palestinian children ‘the beauty of life’.

Spanning six decades in the life of composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein (1918–90), this selection comprises 650 letters, in which he corresponds with members of his family, fellow musicians such as Aaron Copland, John Cage, Serge Koussevitzky and Stephen Sondheim, and admirers including Jacqueline Kennedy and Bette Davis. The volume also features Bernstein’s lengthy exchange with Walter Hussey, Dean of Chichester, which documents the process of commissioning, composing and performing the Chichester Psalms.

‘I love images almost as much as music,’ said Claude Debussy, and he was fortunate to live and compose in Paris, then the art capital of the world. Published to accompany an exhibition at Smith College, Massachusetts, this illuminating book explores his passion for painting, and the visual culture of the city at the turn of the century. The superb reproductions include works by the artists who inspired him, including Turner, Whistler, Degas and Toulouse-Lautrec.

Born in New Jersey in 1915, Frank Sinatra began singing with various dance bands from the 1930s and in a six-decade career became one of the most influential musical artists of the 20th century as well as an Oscar-winning actor. Marking the centenary of his birth, this large-format celebration draws on the Sinatra family archive to present unseen photographs and ephemera from his life, and includes contributions from Tony Bennett and Sinatra’s children: Nancy, Tina and Frank Jr.

The comedy for which Mike Harding became well known in the 1970s and 1980s grew out of increasingly lengthy stories told between songs during folk-club performances, and was inextricably linked to his Lancashire background. This memoir focuses on his early life in post-war Crumpsall, his Irish Catholic upbringing and schooling, memories of Manchester in the early 1960s and his formative musical experiences playing in beat groups while studying for his A levels.

Created in 1987 to produce affordable digital recordings, the Naxos label is now the world’s leading provider of classical music. This history of the company explains how it grew despite opposition from established labels and why the catalogue expanded from its core repertoire to include early music and specialist material. As well as interviews with Naxos artists, the book also features information on the day-to-day operation of the business and the process of editing, production, distribution and promotion. Foreword by Naxos founder Klaus Heymann.

Growing up in a humble shack in America’s poorest state, Elvis Presley dreamed that success would free him from poverty. So how did he become dependent on bank loans even after achieving huge worldwide fame, and why did he despise his own movies and songs, even fearing that he would be forgotten after his death? This biography focuses on identifying the origins of the contradictions and frailties that lay behind Elvis’s charming, confident onstage persona.

Aimed at amateur string players, this guide lists 260 compositions for chamber ensembles, from trios to octets, by composers ranging from Haydn and Mozart to Sibelius and Shostakovich. It features biographical sketches of the composers, a short analytical description of each movement and an assessment of the works’ musical appeal, degree of difficulty and potential pitfalls. (Expanded and revised edition of Chamber Music: Notes for Players.)

With mesmeric symphonies, operas and film scores, Philip Glass has shaped the dominant idioms of today’s classical music. In this autobiography he identifies the family, friends, teachers and places that influenced him most, from his childhood in post-war Baltimore through studies in Chicago and New York to travels in India and Africa. Describing the thrill of artistic creation, he recalls studying with the formidable Nadia Boulanger and collaborating with such eminent figures as Ravi Shankar, Allen Ginsberg and Martin Scorsese. American-cut pages.