The very public crusade to save RCA Studio A in Nashville was spearheaded by Ben Folds, seen here during a press conference in the facility this past summer. Photo: Kerry Kopp.
Nashville, TN (November 24, 2014)—The much-contested historic RCA Studio A in Nashville, which narrowly avoided being demolished earlier this year, will officially be sold to the non-profit group Americana Music Triangle (AMT) Trust on December 31. The non-profit aims to announce plans for the studio’s future on March 29, 2015, which will be the facility’s 50th anniversary.
According to reports in The Tennessean, preservationist/philanthropist Aubrey Preston is leading the AMT Trust team as it purchases the studio from its current owners, Bravo Development. Preston intends for his group to research Studio A’s history and use the resultant findings as the basis for its plans going forward. Over the years, the studio has hosted recording sessions by the likes of BB King, Loretta Lynn, Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton, Tony Bennett, Chet Atkins, Nancy Sinatra, Miranda Lambert, Perry Como, Charley Pride, Keith Urban and many other name artists.
For the last dozen years, indie rocker Ben Folds has rented the facility, one of the last remaining old-school studios on the city’s fabled Music Row. When plans to redevelop the building at 30 Music Square into condos and a restaurant surfaced earlier this year, Folds initiated a widely supported campaign to save the studio—an effort that gained national attention and sparked a regional debate about what the loss of facilities like Studio A means for Nashville’s character and history. The city has undergone a major development boom in recent times—a mixed blessing that has seen Nashville get a considerable economic boost, but at the cost of losing numerous revered—but arguably dying—sites of the region’s musical heritage.
Preston plans to use the expected historical findings about RCA Studio A to determine the next course of action for the site. While those plans may include efforts like attaining protective zoning that would keep the building in its current configuration, a main focus will be to find a new owner—AMT Trust seeing itself as a temporary footnote in the building’s history—that will respect and preserve the integrity of the building and its musical heritage.
Save Studio A
savestudioa.com
