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The experience of music is universal and at the same time, deeply personal to both artists and listeners. From classical to modern popular music, the stories of artists and their music adds a new layer of insight to our understanding. A genre of its own, music biographies and memoirs seek to reveal the inspiration and geniuses who have created some of today’s most enduring popular music. Released this year, the following are some of the best you may have missed:?

• In Boys in the Trees: A Memoir, Carly Simon, well known for her #1 hit “You’re So Vain,” details her life as singer and songwriter, from a privileged childhood to award-winning fame. ?
• Sinatra: The Chairman by James Kaplan both exposes and celebrates the controversial life of crooner Frank Sinatra, who would have been 100 years old this December.
• While well-known today for her starring role in the television show Portlandia, Carrie Brownstein’s new book, Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl: A Memoir, tells the journey of her days as a member of the all-female punk-rock band Sleater-Kinney.

Additional suggestions include: It’s a Long Story: My Life by Willie Nelson, Never Broken: Songs Are Only Half the Story by Jewel, Over the Top and Back: The Autobiography by Tom Jones, Words Without Music: A Memoir by Philip Glass, and Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink by Elvis Costello.?

Musicians, like many artists, draw from their own life experience and reward readers by telling their stories in these books. In their own way, all of these works provide new perspective on the artists we are familiar with, and bring us a step close to knowing them beyond their music and public persona.?