RCA Studio B was a music recording studio built in 1956 in Nashville, Tennessee by RCA Victor. Originally known simply as "RCA Studios," Studio B, along with the larger and later RCA Studio A became known in the 1960s for being an essential factor to the development of the musical production style and sound engineering technique known as the Nashville Sound. In the two decades the studio was in operation, RCA Studio B produced 60 percent of the Billboard magazine's Country chart hits. The studio closed in 1977. The studio is located centrally in the Nashville's historic Music Row district. Since 1992 the studio has been under the ownership of the Country Music Hall of Fame, which offers scheduled tours of the facilities. Early history After years of using portable equipment to record projects in various recording facilities around Nashville, in 1954 Steve Sholes and Chet Atkins established RCA Victor's first Nashville recording facility within the Methodist Television Radio & Film Commission building at 1525 McGavock Street. In January, 1956, Sholes and Atkins produced a session with Elvis Presley, during which he recorded the song Heartbreak Hotel that would become his first gold record and the biggest-selling single of 1956. Studio Business offices resided in the single-story front of the building, with studio facilities in the rear. The studio measured , with a high ceiling. A grand piano, acquired from NBC's Tonight Starring Steve Allen, sat in the corner. The small control room was only deep, and housed an RCA radio station tube console with 12 microphone inputs and four outputs, which fed an Ampex 2-track deck. An echo chamber occupied the second story. In March, 1959, Bill Porter replaced Bob Ferris, RCA Studio B's first chief engineer, and by June had mixed a number one hit: "The Three Bells" by The Browns. Porter considered the studio's acoustics problematic, with resonant room modes creating an uneven frequency response. To lessen the problem, he took some $60 from the studio's petty cash and bought fiberglass acoustic ceiling panels which he cut into triangles and hung from the ceiling at varying heights; these were dubbed "Porter Pyramids". Porter also marked "X"es on the floor where he discovered, by careful experimentation, the resonant modes to be minimal. Porter positioned lead vocalists, background vocalists, and acoustic guitarists at microphones placed directly over his marks. After these improvements, Don Gibson recorded his album Girls, Guitars