Film and music industry heavyweights Hans Zimmer, Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, and Steven Kofsky have banded together to purchase Maida Vale Studios, with refurbishment plans to upgrade facilities for the next generation.
Maida Vale Studios has been sold to Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner, the co-chairmen of Working Title, in a consortium with Hans Zimmer and Steve Kofsky, in a four-way purchase in which its legacy as a center for pioneering music will continue.
With plans to keep the original facade of the building and preserve the aesthetic of Maida Vale, the building will remain a studio space with a multi-million-pound refurbishment plan for its existing facilities. There will also be the creation of a not-for-profit educational facility and a long-term commitment to providing local jobs, innovation, and investment.
Having first been bought by the BBC in 1933, Maida Vale Studios has become a beloved and seminal part of music history. Since then, it has seen use by artists like David Bowie, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and Dusty Springfield and has become a home for the BBC Performing Group.
“Maida Vale Studios has been synonymous with artistic excellence for generations. The venue has become part of the fabric of the UK’s pioneering cultural industry, from helping to nurture new and ground-breaking artists to housing some of the world’s most legendary musicians,” said Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner.
“We are thrilled to be partnering with our old friends Hans Zimmer and Steve Kofsky on this once-in-a-lifetime project, and collectively, we are determined to continue the BBC’s legacy at Maida Vale by attracting global talent to the UK. Through our redevelopment plans, we will future-proof the historic site, continuing its presence in the local community with a new education facility whilst creating a world-class studio space for the next generation of composers, producers, and engineers.”
“The first time I worked for the BBC at their Maida Vale Studios was 45 years ago. I was just a kid, in awe, honored to be booked to play on one of my first sessions,” says Hans Zimmer. “I still remember the strong pull, the desire to touch the walls, as if that would somehow allow me to connect to the artists whose extraordinary music had resonated against these walls on a daily basis.”
“This was a place of revolutionary science in the service of Art; this was a place that inspired you to give your best, where music was performed around the clock, and Art was taken seriously, for the people by the people. This was the place that kept a struggling musician like me from giving up,” Zimmer continues.
“So now I want to close the circle: make Maida Vale Studios a place that inspires, teaches, technologically serves the arts and humanity — and gives the next generation the same opportunities I was given: to create and to never give up.”
The sale of Maida Vale comes after an announcement in 2018 of the BBC’s plans to move its music studios and performing groups from its Maida Vale location to a new, purpose-built recording and studio space in Stratford’s cultural quarter of East Bank in East London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park.
The new BBC Music Studios in East Bank are scheduled to open in late 2025, including tailor-made spaces to accommodate the world’s biggest musical acts and ensembles.
