From award-winning scores for Gravity, Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, Wicked and KPop Demon Hunters, working with composers like John Williams, Alexandre Desplat, Andrew Lockington and Howard Shore, to artist sessions with Jamie Cullum, Sigur Rós and RAYE.

Thirty years ago, Andrew Dudman arrived at Abbey Road at the beginning of a journey that would take him from student to one of the foremost British film scoring engineers. In fact, getting here had been part of the plan for some time.

While studying on the Tonmeister course at the University of Surrey, Andrew had set his sights on Abbey Road for his third-year placement, making it the focus of his first two years at university.

The placement gave him his first opportunity to learn inside the studios and, after returning to Surrey to complete his degree, he came straight back to Abbey Road as an employee. Three decades later, he now sits as Senior Recording Engineer and runs proceedings on many of our biggest sessions.

Andrew has helped capture music for some of cinema's most recognisable worlds, pioneering video game scores and records by artists across pop, rock, jazz, electronic and classical music. But the journey began much more simply: with a young engineer determined to get through the doors and learn.

One of the threads running through Andrew's career is the importance of learning from the people around you.

For Andrew, that has meant working in an environment where generations of engineering knowledge sit alongside constant technological change and absorbing the lessons passed down by the engineers who came before him.

Some were wonderfully simple. One principle Andrew remembers is that “big instruments have big mics.” Others have shaped the way he approaches the biggest sessions of his career.

“The first take you record could be the magic take,” Andrew has said. When you're working with a large orchestra, there is little room to spend the opening takes figuring out how the session is going to work. Everything needs to be ready.

That preparation extends far beyond microphone choices. Detailed setup sheets, floor plans and an experienced team all contribute to making a major session feel effortless when the red light comes on.

From those early days at Abbey Road came career-spanning blockbuster films, landmark scores, video games, classical music and records by artists from across the musical spectrum.

Andrew's career has placed him at the heart of the music behind some of cinema's most recognisable worlds, from Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Mission: Impossible, Jason Bourne, the Twilight Saga and Pirates of the Caribbean to standout films including Gravity, Brave, The King's Speech, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Into the Woods, Hacksaw Ridge, Baby Driver, The Little Mermaid, Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio, Mufasa: The Lion King and so many more.

But across 30 years, there have also been projects that reflect the changing scale and ambition of what can be created inside the studios.

One significant early session was composer Richard Jacques' score for Headhunter - the first video game score to be captured at Abbey Road. Recorded with a 76-piece orchestra in Studio One, at the time it was an ambitious project technically as well as musically, with two Pro Tools sessions running together during the recording.

Andrew would later work with Jacques again on more than five hours of music for Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy game - an Ivor Novello-winning score that was also nominated for BAFTA and GRAMMY Awards.

Among the standout projects is Alfonso Cuarón's Gravity. Steven Price's score, recorded by Andrew, became an integral part of the film's sonic world. The film received ten Academy Award nominations, winning seven Oscars, and led the BAFTAs with 11 nominations, going on to win six awards.

Thirty years after first coming through the doors, Andrew's work shows little sign of slowing down.

Beyond film, he has worked on sessions for Underworld, Elbow, Sigur Rós, Jamie Cullum, Royal Blood, Gabriels, Professor Green, Alexis Ffrench, Nigel Kennedy, Viktoria Mullova, Kenny Wheeler, Gary Barlow, Robbie Williams and Justice, bringing the same expertise in orchestral and large-scale sessions to records spanning pop, rock, jazz, electronic and classical music.

More recently, Andrew has worked with RAYE, recording and mixing across numerous tracks for her latest album, This Music May Contain Hope.

His latest film projects also include Disney’s Snow White and KPop Demon Hunters, for which he recorded strings across the songs, including Golden, as well as the score. Bookending his career to date Andrew has had the pleasure of recording and mixing John Williams’ Star Wars and Harry Potter music for the Disney and Universal Theme Parks.

Three decades after arriving at Abbey Road as a student, Andrew continues to lead the charge on major film and soundtrack productions and some of contemporary music's most exciting artists.

The credits are extraordinary but perhaps the greater story of Andrew's 30 years at Abbey Road is the knowledge behind them.

It's in knowing when to put another microphone out - and when not to use it. Knowing that musicians need to see and feel one another. Knowing that preparation matters because the very first take might be the one nobody can recreate. And it's in passing that knowledge on.

Andrew once arrived at Abbey Road as a student looking for the opportunity to learn. Thirty years later, he is one of the engineers from whom the next generation is learning.

Congratulations on 30 years, Andrew.