Phil McDonald, the recording engineer who shared a Grammy Award for The Beatles’ Abbey Road, has died. Abbey Road Studios announced his death on October 27, 2026. No cause was given. He was born in 1946 and is survived by his wife, Sandra.
McDonald was one of the few engineers credited on the back cover of Abbey Road, the album named after the studio where he spent the first part of his career.
From tape library to Beatles sessions
He joined EMI’s studios in St John’s Wood at the age of 18 in 1964, starting in the tape library before becoming a tape operator, the junior engineer who ran the tape machines. According to Mark Lewisohn’s The Beatles Recording Sessions, his first work for the band came in April 1965, on mono mixes of “Help!”, and he was soon assisting on sessions, including the recording of “Yesterday” that June.
He worked on Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and the White Album, and in 1969 stepped up to balance engineer, the main engineer on a session. He recorded nearly all of the Abbey Road sessions, alone or alongside Geoff Emerick, and the pair won the 1970 Grammy for Best Engineered Recording, Non-Classical.
Later career
McDonald went on to work at Apple Studios and engineered records for John Lennon, George Harrison, Paul McCartney and Wings, and Ringo Starr. His other credits included the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Syd Barrett, Roy Orbison, the Traveling Wilburys, Deep Purple, Squeeze, Ravi Shankar, Nilsson, Stealers Wheel and Roger Daltrey.