Abbey Road Studios - London, England (1969)

Probably the most famous set of recording studios in the world, Abbey Road is now 73-years-old. Best known as the place The Beatles and Sir George Martin created some of the finest pop music ever, it was actually transformed from a private residence to a classical studio by Captain Osmund ‘Ozzy’ Williams. Aptly, the first session at the new HMV Studio (as it was known then), saw Sir Edward Elgar conduct the London Symphony Orchestra in his composition “Land Of Hope And Glory,” but it also hosted everything from Glenn Miller’s final recordings to Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon and, more recently, Oasis.

During the ’60s, Abbey Road’s Studio 2 became synonymous with The Beatles. “It was where they first started,” says Geoff Emerick, the band’s legendary engineer. “It was like home to them.” Emerick started at Abbey Road when he was 16 and says the technical training he received was second to none. There he worked with producer Martin as a recording and mixing engineer on The Beatles’ final session and, arguably, finest album, Abbey Road. “George and I had a really good working relationship,” says Emerick, who’s now writing an autobiography about his years with The Beatles. “And because we’d worked together so often, towards the end we didn’t used to say a lot in sessions because we could read each other’s minds.”

Originally titled Everest after the cigarette brand Emerick favored, Abbey Road was eventually named after the leafy street on which the ‘EMI Studio’ is still situated. The record is Martin’s favorite by The Beatles and, during the sessions, he utilized the studio’s brand-new 8-track recording capabilities to capture the band’s increasingly complex compositions, including side two’s epic medley. The result: a musical masterpiece that will forever be a benchmark in rock ’n’ roll.

To read about other classic sessions and the studios that shaped them, take a look at our feature, Just For the Record.