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Sound engineer Phil McDonald dies

Posted October 31, 2026 by Floydian Slip

Abbey Road Studios

Phil McDonald, a sound engineer at EMI’s Abbey Road studios (pictured), has died.

The studio announced his death Oct. 27. It gave no age nor cause. Wikipedia lists his age as 80 at his passing on Oct. 25.

McDonald built an impressive resume with The Beatles, including work on “Revolver,” “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” “The White Album” and “Abbey Road.” He earned 1970’s “Best Engineered Recording – Non-Classical” Grammy Award for his efforts on the later, along with Geoff Emerick.

He also worked on solo projects for all members of The Beatles, as well as Eric Clapton, Harry Nilsson, Deep Purple, Squeeze, Roy Orbison and many others.

He was one of five engineers credited on Pink Floyd co-founder Syd Barrett‘s “The Madcap Laughs” album, released on 1970.

(Photo: Abbey Road exterior in 2005; Wikipedia, under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.)

 

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