This is released under the umbrella of Cambridge Music Handbooks, which usually deals with works of classical music. He tries to place Sgt Pepper in context, what led the Beatles up to it, how they put it together, and how it has impacted music since. Also, there is a song by song commentary.

I felt that this book was a bit harder to read than other books which have dealt with the subject, particularly Mark Lewisohn's wonderful books, Beatlesongs, or Hard Day's Write. I feel that the weakest part of the book is the commentary, which often reads too much into the song structures. The commentary attempts to analyze each song as if it were classical music. The author seems to read more into the song structures than the Beatles themselves could have intended and it comes off as being somewhat pretentious. The Legacy chapter is also weak as it only considers how other groups copied the structure of Pepper as a "concept album", not much on how Pepper impacted music as a whole.

This kind of a book will be of interest only to Beatles completists or those with interest in analysis of song structures.

At the heart of the matter is the question: Is Sgt Pepper a piece of modern classic music? If one were to look at the other books in the Cambridge Music Handbook series (they're all on works of classical composers, [and here I do not refer to the "Classical" period, but to the generic category of classical]), the question seems already answered, and all that remains is to see just how Mr. Moore will prove this. This he does achieve, albeit through much technical information (both musical and socio-cultural), rather than through truly moving and eloquent persusasion. Moore's analysis of each song's music is fascinating (how the Beatles aurally represent concepts) and his thematic analysis is equally good, even if you don't always agree with him (I mean, is "Within You, Without You" really the pivotal song of the album?) But that aside, his commentary on "A Day in the Life" is excellent. Here even the distanced scholar is moved, he writes (paraphrase here) "...the final chords [of the Sgt Pepper reprise] have not yet died away when the strumming of a lone acoustic guitar begin and the innocent listener is lead into one of the most harrowing songs ever written...". All in all, a good effort and worth the reading of every Beatles fan, student of music or pop culture.