ABBEY ROAD STUDIOS IS OPENING ITS DOORS TO THE PUBLIC THIS MONTH

The legendary Abbey Road Studios is opening its doors to the public this month, with a series of talks that take visitors behind the scenes to where the magic happens.

The world-famous recording studios this month it will open its doors for a series of talks that reveal the magical musical mastery that has taken place there over the years.

Filling music fans in on the secrets of the studio is Brian Kehew – record producer, engineer, musician and author of one of the most comprehensive books on The Beatles’ time at the studio. 

“I still remember my first time visiting,” he tells Scout London. “It was very significant for me, it was like coming home to Mecca. It felt like you were entering a very holy or special room. Many people feel that there is a vibe in there. I don’t know whether it’s just Beatle fandom or people do actually feel something in there.”

Alongside co-author and co-speaker Kevin Ryan, Kehew spent a painstaking 15 years researching and writing his book, Recording The Beatles, that documented in exact detail the processes used by The Beatles – and many other huge artists such as Pink Floyd, The Hollies, Adele and Oasis – to achieve such impressive results at the north London studios.

“I think the impression people have is that the artists who have come through Abbey Road have been the greatest in their era, across many decades now, all the way back to 1930s,” says Kehew. “They were the greatest of their time and it all reflects back on the studio.”

That said, Kehew is quick to point out that much of the studio’s fame harks back to the Fab Four: “I think The Beatles thing is probably about 90 per cent of the recognition, as they named an album after it and the famous photograph enhances it. But when we wrote the book, for us it was not so much about The Beatles but about the studio and the recording process. We became very involved with people who were working at the studio at the time.”

The studio has also been used to record film soundtracks for major movies such as Harry Potter and Star Wars. And alongside its illustrious musical past, Kehew also discovered a few secrets: “At one point there was a time when the largest room – which was used for a classical orchestra, it’s probably the top orchestra room in the world – wasn’t really used by anyone. So they’d put in a badminton court to have games in there when it was empty.”

As well as listening to the talks, visitors to the studio will get to see rare archive photos and film, while also witnessing some of the vintage equipment in action. There’ll be a film score sync demonstration, plus demonstrations of the studio’s famous echo chamber and a vintage four-track mixing console and tape machine. 

“The Beatles are a fraction of what we talk about, as we cover 81 years,” explains Kehew, “although they are the main reason people come, so we give them a larger fraction than anyone else. But all of it is important. There are people from the 30s and 40s who were selling millions of records even back then.”

Kehew and Ryan will also be showing photographs by photographer Henry Grossman, who they published a book about earlier this year. 

“Henry worked with the Beatles longer than any other photographer and he simply put the photographs away rather than publish them,” Brian explains. “We found he had over 6,000 Beatles images that were not only unseen, but are the best photos of The Beatles I’ve ever seen. He’s an incredible artist. We’ll be showing some images during the talks as there are some taken in the studio that are just beautiful.”

That Hippie Penny Lane