I DIDN'T PLAN THIS. IT PLANNED ME.
The story of Ritual Sound Lab is not a straight line. It's more like a frequency finding its form.
FROM THE STUDIO TO THE ROOM.
I've been a musician my entire life. Formally trained. Jazz improvisation from an early age — where I learned that it's the notes you don't play that make the cut.
That led to New York. Years as an audio engineer and producer, deep in the mechanics of how sound is built, layered, and felt. Electronic music followed naturally — ambient, downtempo, dub techno. The slow-moving harmonic structures. The texture. The space between sounds.
At the same time I was moving toward yoga and meditation. Became a certified instructor. Started teaching. And somewhere in that overlap — between the electronic music studio and the yoga room — I stumbled into a sound bath.
I didn't expect much. What I found was a sonic architecture I already knew. The harmonic movement. The use of space. The way a room responds to frequency. It was everything I'd been doing experimentally — just with different instruments.
I was hooked. And immediately frustrated.
THE SOUND WAS RIGHT. THE SERMON WASN'T.
Traditional sound baths are powerful. I believe that completely — I've felt it myself. But they often come wrapped in spiritual framing that not everyone can receive. The mystical language. The prescribed experience. The sense that you need to arrive already believing something.
I didn't think that was necessary. The frequency works regardless. The nervous system responds whether you believe in it or not. I wanted to find a way to let the sound do its job without putting up walls around who it was for.
So I started building something different.
NOT A BOWL GUY. NOT A PLAYLIST. SOMETHING ELSE.
What makes Ritual Sound Lab different isn't just the instruments — it's the intelligence behind them.
My background is improvisation. Reading a room. Understanding that the space itself is an instrument. That the energy of the people in it shapes what needs to happen next. Jazz taught me that. Two decades of live performance confirmed it.
I'm not afraid to get weird. To make new sounds out of traditional practice. To layer a 36" gong against analog synthesis and granular processing and find something that didn't exist before. Everything tuned to 432hz. Everything played live. Everything responding to what's actually happening in the room — not what was planned in a rehearsal.
This is sound design applied to human experience. And I'm the only one in the room making it happen.
I DON'T SPEAK DURING SESSIONS. EVER.
No guided imagery. No instructions on how to breathe. No suggestions about what you might be feeling or what the experience means.
That's not an oversight — it's the whole point. The moment I speak, I'm influencing your experience. I'm putting my interpretation between you and the frequency. And that's not my job.
My job is the sound. Yours is whatever happens next. I don't need to know what that is. Neither do you — not yet.
From the first note to the last, it's just frequency. What you do with it is entirely yours.
RITUAL WAS BUILT IN FLORIDA.
IT WAS DESTINED FOR HERE.
Portland takes craft seriously. It holds the weird with pride. It builds community around things that actually matter and has very little patience for things that don't.
That's exactly where this belongs. I came here because Ritual Sound Lab is a Portland business in its bones — independent, intentional, and unafraid to be exactly what it is.
I'm new to this city. The work isn't.
COME FIND OUT WHAT THIS SOUNDS LIKE.
I keep a small amount of mystery on purpose. The rest reveals itself in the room.
That's where I'll see you.
THE SHORT VERSION.
Formally trained musician. Jazz improvisation. Two decades as an audio engineer and producer in New York City. Certified Bikram and Hatha yoga instructor. Years of electronic music production, live performance, and sound design. All of it applied — every session, every time.
No shortcuts. No playlist. Just the work.