Abbey Road Studios launches songwriting competition


It’s All About Your Topline



Abbey Road Studios announces a new songwriting competition, It’s All About Your Topline.

Running for seven days from Wednesday 22 April, the competition invites participants in the UK & US to record originally written songs on Topline, Abbey Road’s free songwriting app, and submit alongside their name, country and track title. These submissions will then be shortlisted by a team of Abbey Road Studios engineers before moving onto a judging panel.

For this competition, Abbey Road Studios has hand-picked a panel of judges, consisting of some of their closest songwriting collaborators and friends including Abbey Road’s Chief Creative Advisor Nile Rodgers, together with Jamie Scott (One Direction, Rag’n’Bone Man, Rudimental & Jess Glynne), Giorgio Tuinfort (David Guetta, Rihanna, Ariana Grande & Whitney Houston) and Poo Bear (Justin Bieber & Mariah Carey). Each judge will choose a winner from the shortlist and work with them during a 30-minute online feedback session.

How does the competition work?

Record your track using Topline and send to Abbey Road, including your name, country and song title.

A panel of Abbey Road engineers will shortlist a maximum of 5-8 songs for each judge to review.

  • Dan Hayden, Recordist – Noel Gallagher, Dave, Paul McCartney, Harry Styles, Coldplay
  • Chris Parker, Assistant Engineer – Kano, Nile Rodgers, Sam Smith, Brockhampton
  • Andy Maxwell, Assistant Engineer – Brockhampton, Jaden Smith, Liam Gallagher, Beyonce & Jay-Z
  • Alex Wharton, Mastering Engineer – Paul McCartney, Apparat, My Bloody Valentine, Radiohead, Massive Attack & Coldplay
  • Oli Morgan, Mastering Engineer – Bastille, Blossoms, Gregory Porter & Princess Nokia

Who are the judges?

Nile Rodgers – legendary songwriter, artist, arranger and producer; writer of the iconic Le Freak, Good Times, We Are Family, Upside Down, Get Lucky, Lose Yourself To Dance, I’m Coming Out, I Want Your Love

Poo Bear – producer and writer of I Don’t Care (Ed Sheeran & Justin Bieber), 10,000 Hours (Dan + Shay and Justin Bieber), 2U (David Guetta & Justin Bieber), I’m the One (DJ Khaled), Despacito (Luis Fonsi & Daddy Yankee ft. Justin Bieber), What Do You Mean? (Justin Bieber), Caught Up (Usher), Where Are Ü Now (Jack Ü with Justin Bieber)

Jamie Scott – writer of Story of My Life (One Direction), Cold Water (Major Lazer ft. Justin Bieber & MØ), These Days (Rudimental ft. Jess Glynne, Macklemore and Dan Caplen), Skin (Rag ‘n’ Bone Man), This Town (Niall Horan), Home Again (Michael Kiwanuka), Drag Me Down (One Direction)

Giorgio Tuinfort – producer and writer of Say My Name (David Guetta, Bebe Rexha & J Balvin), Titanium (David Guetta & Sia), 2U (David Guetta & Justin Bieber), Scared to Be Lonely (Martin Garrix & Dua Lipa), Without You (David Guetta & Usher), Flames (David Guetta & Sia), Right Now (Rihanna), One Last Time (Ariana Grande), Play Hard (David Guetta, Ne-Yo & Akon)

Each judge will choose their own winner based on the criteria of originality, invention and artistic values of the submitted song.

Each of the four winners will win a 30-minute feedback session via online video conference, organised and provided by Abbey Road. The winners’ songs and judges’ feedback will be streamed on Abbey Road’s Instagram channel. https://www.instagram.com/abbeyroadstudios/.

Abbey Road’s Head of Digital, Dom Dronska, who developed Topline says:

We hear from our fellow musicians and songwriters how they miss the studios and having close contact with their fellow artists. While we can’t give them access to our studios just yet, we can share an online space, where they can capture their songs without equipment, and they can share them easily with us, with their producers or topliners. We want to give them a reason to write and offer inspiration from some prolific songwriters connected to us, creating a big songwriting momentum. Let’s hear some new songs which can pull us through the most difficult times, with lyrics which fade into our dreams, helping us to accept life as it is.

Abbey Road’s Head of Brand & Communications, Mark Robertson says:

We want to be a source of inspiration and support to all creatives navigating this unsettling time, and this competition exemplifies the spirit of collaboration that we see in the house when we are open. Nile’s songwriting at Abbey Road is symbolic of how we are transforming the studios. He’s written over 100 songs with artists including Bruno Mars, Anderson .Paak, SG Lewis, David Guetta, Jorja Smith and Rudimental. His unparalleled body of work and expertise as a producer mean there couldn’t be a better person to guide and lead this competition. Thanks to his manager Merck Mercuriadis, we have three more of the biggest writers in the world as mentors in the shape of Poo Bear, Giorgio Tuinfort and Jamie Scott, making this an unmissable chance to learn from the best.

About Topline:
Abbey Road Studios’ free Topline app helps users capture musical ideas instantly and precisely before that valuable moment is lost. Users can sing over imported tracks, add lyrics tags and pictures, easily share files and sync to the cloud to save space on your device. A new version of the iOS app will be launched soon. Future features will include reverb and mixing panel to improve the quality of Topline recordings.

For further information on Topline, please visit: https://www.abbeyroad.com/apps


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