Italian pianist and composer Francesco Lotoro has been on a lifelong quest to find this remarkable music. He has painstakingly salvaged and performed symphonies, operas and songs written by the incarcerated musicians, many of whom died in the camps. He has travelled the globe to meet with families and survivors whose harrowing testimonies bear witness to the most devastating experiences in twentieth-century history.

Movingly piecing together the human stories of those who wrote and performed whilst imprisoned, this compelling book takes readers on a journey into their extraordinary lives and music, shining a light on a unique beauty that somehow prevailed against all odds.

What is a ‘good death’?

How about this: After years of terrible health, you gather friends and admirers for one last, glorious party. A couple of weeks later, you slip away, surrounded by your loving family. Then, the world comes to mourn. That is how Birmingham’s favourite son, Ozzy Osbourne, died.

By his death in June 2025 – at an age few believed he’d reach – Ozzy was much-loved, far beyond the metal world. Once a feared, demonic figure to some (and a joke to others), his Back to the Beginning farewell concert at Villa Park raised millions for charity.

In concise, arresting chapters moving from Death to Life via Art, Politics, Sex, Bodies, Voice, Family, Myth and more, Kahn-Harris explores how Ozzy – of all people! – attracted such generosity of spirit. The answer, he finds, is deeply embedded within the story and culture of metal – and has lessons for us all.

'Unmissable… sparkling, witty and shrewd. In a world of music books retelling tired legends, Men of a Certain Age offers that rare thing: an entirely original take on rock history', Alexis Petridis

'Fascinating, funny and tender' ADAM BUXTON

'My favourite writer and interviewer' JUDE ROGERS

'If Kate Mossman's name is on it, then I want to read it' PETE PAPHIDES

'Terrific' GUARDIAN

From Jeff Beck to Ray Davies, Jon Bon Jovi to Kevin Ayers, Kate Mossman has long fostered an interest in male musicians of a certain age.

Why is it that when I meet them, I feel something ignite inside me? What is this strange connection – to feel so excited, yet so at ease? And how is it that in the presence of a wrinkly rock star twice my age, I sometimes feel like I'm meeting . . . me?
Featuring nineteen long-form profiles lovingly constructed for The Word magazine and the New Statesman, Men of a Certain Age chronicles the lives of some of the biggest rock stars of our time, including Brian May, Gene Simmons, Terence Trent D'Arby, Johnny Rotten and Nick Cave.

The book is a meditation on the powerful archetype of the ageing rock star, but it is also a personal story – of music and obsession, and of the deep unconscious projections at play in our relationships with the famous people who most capture our hearts. As Kate travels 5,000 miles to try and find Glen Campbell, and to the depths of the Cornish countryside for a rendezvous with Roger Taylor, will she finally unravel the roots of her obsession with the elder statesmen of rock?

Wigmore Hall does not boast a grand façade, but behind it lies something extraordinary: one of the world’s most beloved concert halls, within whose walls we find exceptional performers, composers, impresarios and, of course, audiences. The story of Wigmore Hall is the story of music in the 20th and 21st centuries – and of London itself.

In this illuminating book, bestselling author Julia Boyd digs deep into the Hall’s rich history to uncover the secrets of its success. One of London’s prime cultural gems, Wigmore Hall has witnessed fame and failure, love and loss, joy and despair, triumph and tragedy. Reflecting the remarkable changes that have taken place in performance, repertoire and concert-going during its 125 years, it is a tale that encompasses the whole gamut of human experience. Above all, it reminds us of the wonder of music and the artists who create it.

With a stellar cast of performers, among them Ferruccio Busoni, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Benjamin Britten, Myra Hess and Leoš Janácek, not to mention audiences that included Virginia Woolf, Maurice Ravel and Bertrand Russell, this is the sometimes surprising but always intriguing history of ‘London’s most sumptuous temple of music’.

Praise for Julia Boyd:

‘Utterly absorbing’ The Times

‘Fascinating’ Daily Mail

‘Exceptional' Mail on Sunday

‘Gripping’ Spectator

‘A triumph’ iNews

'It took me ten years to go from shy young girl to punk rocker, if I'd had this book I'd have got there much quicker’ Viv Albertine

For millennia, women’s raised voices have been heard as unruly, uncivilized, dangerous. Women singing were cast as sirens: mythical creatures who lured sailors to their death.

In Vocal Break, Lauren Elkin seamlessly blends memoir, feminist manifesto and cultural history to explore a plurality of female singing voices – and how women have used them to defy convention, genre, capitalism, racism and sexism. Drawing on her own experiences training as a young soprano in the 1990s, Elkin reflects on the way power and identity shape our voices, focusing on the women who most excited her when she was learning to sing.

A vocal break refers to the place where the voice shifts from lower to higher registers and this is a book about what kind of meanings, and sounds, can be made there. Immersing readers in an eclectic soundscape, from musicals and pop music to art punk, what follows is a full-throated tour of women’s voices, including Édith Piaf, Maria Callas, Cyndi Lauper, Kathleen Hanna, Tori Amos, PJ Harvey, Beyoncé, FKA Twigs and Billie Eilish.

Reflecting on what makes women’s singing so powerful – to the point where others feel the need to control or manipulate it – Vocal Break is a joyous call to arms, a siren call:

Girls to the front: NOW.

‘A genuinely great writer, with a winning turn of phrase and dry wit’ Guardian
‘Superlative…Crammed with eyebrow-raising statistics…A delight’ Wall Street Journal
___________

When Paul McCartney closed Live Aid in July 1985 at the grand old age of forty-three, we thought he was on the road to retirement. But as it turns out, he – and many others of his generation – were just getting started.

In the last four decades, the big names of the 60s and 70s have been exploiting the age of spectacle that Live Aid created to enjoy the longest lap of honour in the history of humanity, carrying on long after everyone else had given up.

In this brave new world, Elton John plays a royal funeral, Mick Jagger gets a knighthood, Bob Dylan picks up the Nobel Prize, the Beatles become, if anything, bigger than the Beatles and it's beginning to look as though, thanks to technology, they will all be playing Las Vegas forever.
___________

Praise for David Hepworth

'Such a clever writer' Spectator
'Hepworth's writing is sublime' Daily Mail
'A refreshingly independent thinker' Daily Telegraph
'Reads like a series of rich, fast-paced and immensely funny short stories' The Oldie
'Hepworth's knowledge and understanding of rock history is prodigious' Sunday Times
'The book is destined to become the go-to text on a subject we never thought we'd have to survey' Literary Review

As rock exploded around the world, so young bands would sling their gear into their trusty Ford Transits and bomb up and down the new motorway system to university and polytechnic campuses all over the UK, honing their sound and hoping to get noticed.

A list of acts who put in the hard yards on this circuit reads like a Who’s Who of rock music: Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, the Who, Fleetwood Mac, Black Sabbath, Queen, the Kinks, Dire Straits, AC / DC, Genesis, Nick Drake, Joan Armatrading and Elton John all paid their dues in sweaty and badly ventilated dressing rooms in places like Leeds University and Regent Street Poly. Even Paul McCartney, after the Beatles fell apart, took his new band Wings out on the circuit to get them road tested.

Now, for the first time, seasoned music journalist Paul Sexton sets out to document this extraordinary moment in British music history. Tapping into his huge network of contacts in the music industry, Rock Goes to College is a fascinating, raucous ride of a book, crammed full of incredible, never-before-heard stories of the beginnings of some of the most famous acts on the planet.

I was in the right place at exactly the right time.

I was handed a precious backstage pass to this magical period, as a chronicler of some of its most significant moments, of its wild protagonists, whether in music, entertainment, fashion, football, art or politics.

I had a front-row seat for that insane decade, but it was 1996 that was the period’s stunning apex. Oasis at Maine Road and Knebworth, the births of Robbie Williams the solo star and the Spice Girls, the Euro 96 football tournament and ‘Three Lions’, the rise of New Labour and Tony Blair.

I was there for the lot.

1996. Britpop ruled the airwaves.

The tabloids framed reality long before Instagram.Football was finally coming home. Tony Blair was learning to play rock star – and rock stars were learning they could play politics. Everyone was partying hard, and Britain was the coolest place on earth.

Showbiz reporter Dominic Mohan wasn’t watching the party from afar – he was in the room.

Backstage at Knebworth with Oasis. In strip clubs with Robbie Williams. On the phone to Bowie. On the receiving end of Spice Girls gossip, Gallagher gobbiness and tabloid-era chaos. From Euro ’96 euphoria to Brit Awards anarchy, from rave culture to New Labour, Mohan witnessed the moment the UK went from scruffy indie island to global cultural powerhouse.

Part memoir, part cultural autopsy and part riotous tour through the 90s and its greatest year, 1996 is a jaw-dropping front-row seat to the madness, the music, the football, and the politics that reshaped Britain – and created legends along the way.

Three decades on, Mohan returns to the year everything peaked, and asks: what the hell happened, why did it matter, and can it ever happen again?

If you were there – this book will feel like going home.

If you weren’t – you’ll wish you had been.

This instant Sunday Times bestseller is the definitive book about the music of Oasis, published as the reunion tour was making headlines around the world. A deeply researched tribute to the creative talent and star power of the Gallaghers, A Sound So Very Loud is crammed with unknown detail and the kind of anarchic, brilliantly funny anecdotes that only Oasis could generate.

Music journalists Ted Kessler and Hamish MacBain first met Liam and Noel in 1994, when the brothers were playing tiny venues, and have since interviewed them dozens of times, tracking the astonishing success of Oasis as they became one of the biggest bands in the world.

In this comprehensive telling of the Oasis story through their spectacular back catalogue, Kessler and MacBain focus on the enduring power of the music, exploring the tales behind the lyrics and revealing the background to the writing, recording and impact of all the songs, from megahits like ‘Live Forever’, ‘Wonderwall’ and ‘Champagne Supernova’ to the fan-favourite B-sides and deep cuts such as ‘Acquiesce’, ‘The Masterplan’ and ‘Half the World Away’.

With their unique perspective on all things Oasis, Kessler and MacBain bring this story to life in glorious colour. A Sound So Very Loud is the book every Oasis fan needs on their shelves, destined to be as timeless and as moreish as the music itself.

‘Essential reading. Hamish and Ted have had front row tickets to the Oasis story from the very beginning. There’s no one who knows more about the band, the music and its impact’ – Mat Whitecross, director of Oasis: Supersonic

‘Something special: a book of wit and verve about why Oasis matter’ – The Telegraph