Music and Media alumni nominated for six awards at the 2025 Grammys
One degree of separation: the Surrey connections to Sabrina Carpenter, Taylor Swift, Peter Gabriel and the Beatles
Four Surrey Music and Sound Recording (Tonmeister) alumni have been nominated at the most prestigious awards in the music industry. The 2025 Grammy winners will be announced at a glittering ceremony in Los Angeles this Sunday 2 February, and Tonmeister alumni could be set to scoop up to six awards in total.
The Grammys are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognise outstanding achievements in the music industry. Nominations were announced back in November 2024, and Surrey graduates Oli Jacobs (2014), Katie May (2020), Greg McAllister (2015) and Dom Shaw (2021) all made the shortlist for their engineering and mixing of some of last year’s biggest artists’ albums.
“If you pursue good music and lovely people, then hopefully it takes you to places with artists that are well respected.” Oli Jacobs
The nominations are:
- Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical: Sabrina Carpenter, Short n' Sweet - Engineer: Oli Jacobs
- Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical: Peter Gabriel, i/o - Engineers: Oli Jacobs, Katie May, Dom Shaw
- Album of the Year: Taylor Swift, The Tortured Poets Department - Engineer/Mixer: Oli Jacobs
- Album of the Year: Sabrina Carpenter, Short n' Sweet - Engineer/Mixer: Oli Jacobs
- Record of the Year: Taylor Swift featuring Post Malone, Fortnight - Engineer/Mixer: Oli Jacobs
- Record of the Year: The Beatles, Now and Then - Engineer/ Mixer: Greg McAllister.
No stranger to the Grammys, Oli has previously won Best Engineered Recording, Non-Classical, and Album of the Year in 2023, as Engineer for the album ‘Harry's House’ by Harry Styles.
He says: “I’m really excited and grateful for the Grammy nominations and so happy to be nominated alongside my friends and Tonnie alumni Katie and Dom! Everything started for me at the University of Surrey, especially during the year in industry. The friends and industry contacts I made during the time on the Tonmeister course helped me kickstart my career in music - I wouldn’t be here without them.”
In the past ten years, alumni from the Music and Sound Recording course at the University of Surrey have been nominated for 15 Grammys, and succeeded in going on to win three; plus a Latin Grammy as well. The nominations cover Surrey graduates’ work with pop artists including Taylor Swift, Ed Sheeran, Lewis Capaldi, Meduza, and Alt J, plus engineering on best choral performances and best classical surround sound.
The winners of the 67th Grammy awards will be announced on Sunday 2 February 2025, from 8pm EST. Watch highlights on live.Grammy.com.
Learn more about the Music and Sound Recording (Tonmeister) course at Surrey.