Peter Asher met the Beatles in the spring of 1963, the start of a lifelong association with the band and its members. He had a front-row seat as they elevated pop music into an art form, and he was present at the creation of some of the most iconic music of our times. Asher is also a talented musician in his own right, with a great ear for what is new and fresh. Once, when Paul McCartney wrote a song that John Lennon didn’t think was right for the Beatles, Asher asked if he could record it. “A World Without Love” became a global number-one hit for his duo, Peter & Gordon. A few years later Asher was asked by Paul McCartney to help start Apple Records; the first artist Asher discovered and signed up was a young American singer-songwriter named James Taylor. Before long he would be not only managing and producing Taylor but also (having left Apple and moved to Los Angeles) working with Linda Ronstadt, Neil Diamond, Robin Williams, Joni Mitchell, and Cher, among others. The Beatles from A to Zed grows out of his popular radio program “From Me to You” on SiriusXM’s The Beatles Channel, where he shares memories and insights about the Fab Four and their music. Here he weaves his reflections into a whimsical alphabetical journey that focuses not only on songs whose titles start with each letter, but also on recurrent themes in the Beatles’ music, the instruments they played, the innovations they pioneered, the artists who influenced them, the key people in their lives, and the cultural events of the time. Few can match Peter Asher for his fresh and personal perspective on the Beatles. And no one is a more congenial and entertaining guide to their music.

Though James Taylor's self-titled debut introduced his mellow melodicism and affecting songcraft, Sweet Baby Jameswas the album that rocketed him to national recognition. With Sweet Baby James, Taylor abandoned the slightly psychedelic structural ambition of his first record (the first side was composed as a suite), and settled fully into the folk and country styles to which he is best suited. The top ten hit "Fire and Rain," for instance, a deeply personal story-song based on the artist's experiences in mental hospitals and the suicide of a friend, is built around Taylor's gentle, understated voice, acoustic guitar, cello, piano, and drums. The plaintive, melancholic air of "Fire and Rain" resonated with millions of listeners, as did the rest of the album. Taylor's lyrics, which address personal identity, religion, and relationships lost and struggling, are highly confessional, yet associative and lyrical enough to reflect the lives of listeners. At times, he marries the plight of the sensitive soul to the myth of the cowboy in songs like the title track, a kind of campfire lullaby, or to country traditions, as in "Country Road." In all, these elements combine to make Sweet Baby James, arguably, Taylor's definitive statement, and one of the most influential albums in the singer-songwriter genre.