BLOG | JUN. 11, 2025

Calling All Veterans of the British Studio Scene!

THE GREAT BRITISH RECORDING STUDIOS

Howard Massey, an excellent author and recording engineer, is putting together what should be an important book on the British record studio scene of the sixites and seventies. If you were involved in this world drop him a line! See more info below:

Producers, balance engineers, maintenance engineers, assistant engineers, tape ops and teaboys who worked at a British recording studio in the 1960s or 1970s and would like to share their memories or photographs can contact Howard Massey.

[email him at gbrs@aprs.co.uk]

Music journalist Howard Massey has embarked on an historic project in collaboration with the UK-based APRS (the Association of Professional Recording Services) which will memorialize the iconic English studios of the 1960s and 1970s in a book to be called The Great British Recording Studios. Each chapter of the book will focus on a well-known English studio of the '60s and '70s (including Abbey Road, Olympic, Trident, IBC, Decca, Pye, and more than a dozen others) and will provide comprehensive descriptions of physical facilities and layout, along with equipment and configuration, as well as discussions about the main recording techniques and technical innovations developed at each studio. Equally important will be the people side: listings of key personnel, dozens of photographs, and anecdotal "stories from the studio" that reveal the inner workings behind many of the world's best-loved and most enduring recordings. The Great British Recording Studios will be published by the Hal Leonard Corporation in both hardcover and paperback (as well as eBook format) and will be distributed worldwide.

Massey is best known as the author of the two Behind The Glass collections of interviews with the world's leading engineers and producers. He also co-authored Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick's 2006 memoir Here, There and Everywhere, and has written hundreds of articles for audio magazines. He started his career as a musician and engineer/producer in England, working at Trident, SARM, Pathway and other facilities with artists such as Elvis Costello, The Fixx, Madness, Thomas Dolby and Spandau Ballet.

Tape Op is a bi-monthly magazine devoted to the art of record making.

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