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Music

Music speaks directly to your feelings and comes in many forms. For that reason Tales have selected some of the finest music books just for you. You can for example find a biography of your favorite music idol, but you can also find music theory books that will help you become your own musician. Whether you like rock, pop, musicals or classical music we have the books for you. Find your inner melody with a music book from Tales.
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  • by Paul Harris
    £7.99

    Helps the player overcome problems, by building up a complete picture of each piece, through rhythmic and melodic exercises related to specific technical issues, then by studying prepared pieces with associated questions, and finally 'going solo' with a series of meticulously-graded sight-reading pieces.

  • by Paul Harris
    £7.99

    Helps the player overcome problems, by building up a complete picture of each piece, through rhythmic and melodic exercises related to specific technical issues, then by studying prepared pieces with associated questions, and finally 'going solo' with a series of meticulously-graded sight-reading pieces.

  •  
    £8.99

    The Young Violinist's Repertoire is an ideal introduction to the established repertoire for the violin. Progressively arranged to take the young player from the very early stages to intermediate standard, the four books bring together music from all over Europe and span a wide range of composers, periods and styles. The piano accompaniments remain easy throughout. Titles: 16th Century Italian: Passamezzo Antico * Bach: Gavotte From Suite BWV1012; Gavotte From Suite BWV811 * Baklanova: Fast Dance; Mazurka * Beethoven: German Dance * Couperin: La Bourbonnoise; Gavotte * Cui: From My Homeland * Elgar: Andante From 6 Easy Pieces, Op.22 * Grechaninov: The Joker * Handel: Rigaudon From Almira * Kabalevsky: The Clowns * Mozart: Duo From 12 Duos, K.487; Minuet From Don Giovanni * Traditional: Maytime; Polish Dance * Weber: Gypsy Dance; March Of The Hunters From Der Freischütz.

  • by Ross W. Duffin
    £12.49

    "A fascinating and genuinely accessible guide....Educating, enjoyable, and delightfully unscary."-Classical Music

  • Save 27%
     
    £24.49

    Covering over 1500 singers from the origins of opera to the present day, this book is an essential resource for all serious opera lovers and an indispensable companion to the enormously successful Grove Book of Operas, with more than 40 specially commissioned articles on contemporary singers. The most comprehensive guide to opera singers ever produced.

  • by Dennis Alexander
    £11.49

    Beautifully presented and intelligently paced, the Lesson Books combine unusually attractive music and lyrics. The books feature note reading, rhythm reading, sight-reading and technical workouts. Each piece on the CD was recorded at a performance tempo and a slower practice tempo.

  • by Don Breithaupt
    £10.49

    "Aja" was the album that made Steely Dan a commercial force on the order of contemporaries like Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles and Chicago. A double-platinum, Grammy-winning bestseller, it lingered on the Billboard charts for more than a year and spawned three hit singles. This book paints a detailed picture of the making of a masterpiece.

  • Save 13%
    - A Performer's Guide to Greater Musical Expression
    by David McGill
    £20.99

    An insightful and imaginative study to deepen the performer's approach to music

  • Save 18%
    - Flute - Books 1 and 2
     
    £17.99

    Contains advice on equipment, instructions for an effective embouchure and comfortable posture, and an explanatory section on reading music. This book also includes music, including duets, rounds and ensemble pieces, tests to check progress and comprehension, and useful pull out chart giving all fingerings.

  • by Paul Harris
    £10.99

    Teaching beginners is a huge responsibility and a challenge, but also reaps enormous rewards. This handbook for various instrumental and singing teachers offers a comprehensive advice and practical strategies on how to teach beginners. It also offers solutions to the challenges faced in music education. It discusses practice ideas for beginners.

  • Save 20%
    by Hal Leonard Publishing Corporation
    £23.99

  •  
    £8.49

    Violin Playtime Studies is a first anthology of established and newly-composed studies for the young violinist. Taking as its starting point the one octave scale of D major, and remaining in first position throughout, it may be used in conjunction with the violin Playtime series. This combination of short, purposeful studies enlivened by delightful illustrations will ensure that 'study time' is never dull!

  • Save 21%
    by William J. Peterson, Lawrence Archbold & William Peterson
    £25.99

    Essays by prominent scholars and organists examine the music of Franck and other nineteenth-century French organist-composers through stylistic analysis, study of compositional process, and exploration of how ideas about organ technique and performance-practice traditions developed and became codified.

  • Save 13%
    - The Autobiography Of Nina Simone
    by Nina Simone
    £12.99

    The mesmerizing autobiography of one of the most revered soul, jazz, and blues divas of our time-the late Nina Simone

  • by Joe Harvard
    £10.49

    33 1/3 is a new series of short books about critically acclaimed and much-loved albums of the last 40 years. Each focuses on one album rather than an artist's entire output. Velvet Underground's first album - with the Andy Warhol banana cover - introduced, along with 'Sgt. Pepper', a new form of rock music: the artsy concept album.

  • Save 10%
    by Peter Freestone
    £8.99

    This biography of Freddie Mercury is written by the man who was his personal assistant for the last 12 years of his life. It reveals the truth behind the scandalous rumours and describes the part played in Mercury's life by such famous names as Elton John, Kenny Everett and Elizabeth Taylor.

  • Save 17%
    - The Piano Collection
     
    £17.49

  • Save 22%
    - The Lives and Times of Sun Ra
    by John Szwed
    £13.99

    Quite possibly the most inspirational music biography ever written - essential. MUZIK

  • Save 21%
    by David Lee Roth
    £13.49

    NOBODY NOTICED, YOU KNOW, WHEN THE G-STRING CAME UNDONE -- WELL, I NOTICED -- NOBODY NOTICED THE MONEY, LIKE, FLOATING AROUND. I WOKE UP AT SOME POINT AROUND DAWN, THE TWO OF THEM WERE ASLEEP, AND ALL THREE OF US WERE COVERED WITH MONEY, EVERY SQUARE INCH OF SKIN HAD A DOLLAR BILL PASTED TO IT -- THERE WAS NOTHING BUT.

  • Save 18%
    by Ned Rorem
    £16.49

    "When The Paris Diary exploded on the scene in 1966 there had never been a book in English quite like it: Its intimate combination of personal, literary, and social insights was unprecedented. Rorem's"

  • Save 21%
    by Arnold Schoenberg
    £13.49

    Fundamentals of Musical Composition represents the culmination of more than forty years in Schoenberg's life devoted to the teaching of musical principles to students and composers in Europe and America.

  • - From Johann Joseph Fux's Gradus ad Parnassum
    by Johann Joseph Fux
    £14.99

    The essence of the most celebrated book on counterpoint, Fux's Gradus ad Parnassum.

  • Save 10%
    by Woody Guthrie
    £8.99

    An autobiography of Woody Guthrie, founder of modern American folk music. This book presents a cynical, earthy and tragic account of his life in an Oklahoma oil-boom town, of the Depression that followed, and of his subsequent travels in, on, and under trains, in stolen cars and on his feet, round an America going rotten from the top downwards.

  • Save 21%
    - Neil Young's Biography
    by Jimmy McDonough
    £14.99

    Neil Young is one of rock and roll's most important, influential and enigmatic figures, an intensely reticent artist who has granted no writer access to his inner sanctum - until now.

  • by R.J. (Writer Wheaton
    £10.49

    An album which distilled a genre from the musical, cultural, and social ether, Portishead's "Dummy" was such a complete artistic achievement that its ubiquitous successes threatened to exhaust its own potential. The author offers an impressionistic investigation of "Dummy" that imitates the cumulative structure of the album itself.

  • Save 15%
    by Caroline Sullivan
    £8.49 - 13.49

  • Save 23%
    by Robyn Hitchcock
    £16.99

  • Save 27%
    by Christophe Lebold
    £25.49

    The first English edition of acclaimed French biography of Leonard Cohen. Christophe Lebold unveils Leonard Cohen's enigmatic journey exploring love, faith and existentialism. Through meticulous research and personal encounters, Lebold transcends biography, delving into Cohen's mission to illuminate life's shadows. This book captivates and inspires, inviting readers into life's complexities and darkest corners.

  • Save 15%
    by Ian Broudie
    £10.99 - 16.99

    From post punk Liverpool and Big in Japan to producing and working with acts like Echo & The Bunnymen and The Fall, Ian Broudie established a cult following early in his career.But in 1989, he returned to where it all began: his bedroom, tape recorder and guitar in hand. Out of necessity, with no record contract and no band in place, Ian sang and played everything on the tapes himself, recording in his "spare bedroom".The record took off and his next three records received huge critical acclaim. Released in 1994, Jollification sold over one million copies worldwide and the Lightning Seeds became one of the biggest bands of the '90s.Together with comedians David Baddiel and Frank Skinner, Ian released the 1996 single 'Three Lions' to mark the England football team's participation in Euro 96, the first major football tournament to be held in England since they had won the World Cup in 1966. Three Lions is the only single in chart history to reach number one in the UK singles chart on four separate occasions.Now, following the release of the Lightning Seeds' long-awaited comeback album, Ian shares his memories of a life of musical adventures from 70s Liverpool and Eric's, to Echo & The Bunnymen and gigs across northern England with Big in Japan, to The Coral and The Zutons at the start of a new century, via a 90s rollercoaster of triumphs and mishaps, with the Lightning Seeds from "Pure" to "Three Lions" and beyond!

  • Save 21%
    by Rob Sheffield
    £13.49

Music
Music has that special connection with our feelings. It can both make us happy and sad, help through a crisis and through all the difficult feelings we need to acknowledge. Life is not just about being happy, and music can take you on a journey through all those different feelings. In that way music can function as a form of therapy. Music can comfort you and the lyrics can make you feel embraced and recognized. Some of the songs we love most are those, which have that universal feeling and message in them. Those songs that cover all the different and conflicting feelings of life in a verse. You can learn the secrets behind some of the biggest hits or most beautiful ballads in our selection of music books. 
You could also get to know your biggest idol in our icon books. Some of the music icons have lived an inspiring and sometimes hard life, and you can learn a lot from there stories. We have biographic music books with musicians from different genres, all with their own fascinating story. We have multiple music books about the extremely talented singer Freddie Mercury - the frontman, pianist and songwriter in the legendary band Queen. Freddie Mercury had an amazing career and a magnificent voice, and he was at the same time a huge inspiration for homosexuals and generally everyone, who felt different. The singer must tragically lost his life to AIDS and the world lost one of its biggest stars to date, but you can revisit Freddie Mercury’s amazing talent and read his story in the music books Bohemian Rhapsody - The Definitive Biography of Freddie Mercury, Freddie Mercury - the Biography, Somebody to Love - The Life, Death and Legacy of Freddie Mercury, and many more.

Music books for students
If you are studying the wonderful world of music or just wants to improve your performance you should look at our music theory books. They will help you with all the different techniques no matter the instrument. At Tales you find music books for piano, music books for keyboard and music books for guitar. They will all help you in your musicology study or on your journey to becoming an amazing musician yourself. 
We also have music history books that will take you on a journey with all the greatest from Beethoven and Mozart to Tjajkovskij and Stravinskij. When you travel through the history of music you will also visit different music periods and get a better understanding of why the music sounds so differently throughout history. The music is formed by its time and the historical events of that time. If you are interested in the history of music we will recommend the music history book by Cecil Gray called History of Music. The music book moves in the crossfield between the elementary, educational and tries to give answers to some of the things we do not yet understand. It starts with the Gregorian Chant and moves through investigations of both French, Italian, English, and Russian music. 

Musical
If you like to visit the theatre for a musical you can take some of that magic with you home by finding the books, scripts and lyrics of all the biggest hit shows on Broadway and West End. Experiencing a live performance is something unique, but it is over too fast. That is why we recommend you to dive deeper into your favorite musicals with the music books on Tales. You find the lyrics and story behind the world’s nr. 1 hit musical Hamilton that changed the world. The show won The Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2016 and tells the story of one of America’s Founding Fathers Alexander Hamilton. The musical contains an amazing Grammy award winning soundtrack with the most brilliant lyrics telling the story of the American civil war. The man behind it all is the extremely talented Lin Manuel Miranda, who tells the story of American then, but with the sounds and faces of modern times. You can dive into the fascinating story of Alexander Hamilton and the musical in the book Hamilton: The Revolution or you can learn how to perform the amazing songs yourself with the music books Hamilton - Vocal Selections & Piano or Hamilton - Easy Piano Selections

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