Abbey Road Studios announces the Art Of Recording: Vol 1 – “Out of Thin Air”

03 May 2023 - Press release

 

Today Abbey Road Studios, in partnership with the photographic and typology collective Legacy+Art, presents a series of fine art photographs entitled The Art Of Recording: Vol. 1 – ‘Out of Thin Air’, that pays tribute to the astonishing Abbey Road Studios microphone collection.

The microphones in the collection are the conduits to some of the most iconic recording sessions of all time, and the large format, high resolution artworks created by Legacy+Art unequivocally celebrate the witness marks and patina of the culture defining sessions that are etched into their surface. The series of images contain microphones used on culture defining sessions by artists from The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Ella Fitzgerald, Cilla Black, Fela Kuti and Shirley Bassey, to Oasis, Kate Bush, Amy Winehouse, Frank Ocean, Celeste and Adele, amongst an array of others.

Included in the collection is the Neumann U47, the most iconic of all microphones at Abbey Road, used by almost all of the legendary artists to have recorded at the studios, and continues to be used by many of today’s biggest names.

Producer and composer Giles Martin says: “There is a tangible bond and intimacy between a singer and a microphone. For over 90 years, Abbey Road has been home to some of the greatest recordings of all time with some of the greatest voices in history. From Glenn Miller to Ella Fitzgerald, The Beatles and Pink Floyd, this unique collection of photographs from Rick Guest’s Legacy+Art Collective perfectly illustrates the role these extraordinary microphones have played in the creation of the music we love.”

By using one fine art form to describe another, Legacy+Art has created hyper-detailed, large format artworks that are alive in the most incredible detail, revealing how each iconic recording artist and session has left behind their own visceral fingerprint. Each final image is composited from up to 100 individual photographic frames of varying focal depth and lighting, in order to achieve a resolution, definition and clarity that can reveal every mark and scratch etched into each microphone’s surface, linking us directly to the recording artist and the incredible music created with it.”

This project came into being when Rick Guest was in a soundtrack session in Studio Two and discovered that Abbey Road holds detailed session sheets going back to the early days of recording, clearly showing how and where each microphone was used. Rick says, “I was so moved by the thought that you could look at a microphone and know that it was not only present during many of the most astonishing recording sessions ever made, but that each was instrumental in the capture and shape of that sound. It struck me that these microphones are almost holy artefacts for all lovers of music, and that large scale art works of them could act as a portal to both the music itself and to the moments in our lives that these incredible pieces of music were the soundtrack to.”

Mark Robertson, Head of Brand & Communication, Abbey Road Studios says: “Alongside our recent 90th anniversary celebrations, Mary McCartney’s new film ‘If These Walls Could Sing’ and David Hepworth’s book on 90 years of Abbey Road history, there couldn’t be a better time to explore and spotlight the incredible treasures in our collection. Our microphones are not just instruments of the past; but are constantly used in sessions with today’s top artists and on the world’s biggest film scores. Every microphone is unique; each one a beautiful and complex tool brought to life by legends of music and engineering. These are the portals through which some of the greatest music of all time has been created, quite literally, Out of Thin Air.”

The Art Of Recording: Vol 1 – “Out of Thin Air” is available to buy here and will be accompanied by a private two-day selling exhibition.