Westport, Connecticut

dB Sound
Recording

A professional-grade two-room recording studio built inside a renovated 1940s horse barn — purpose-built for creative collaboration with songwriters, composers and musicians.

Get in Touch Not commercial; purely creative

The Space

A Studio Born
from History

dB Sound Recording occupies a fully renovated 1940s horse barn — itself an extension to a 200-year-old barn — at our Westport home. Every inch of both rooms has been designed and built with serious music-making in mind.

The control room (18 × 11 ft, with 11 ft ceilings) handles every stage of the creative process: writing, production, tracking, mixing, and critical listening. A large video monitor makes it equally suited for film and game scoring. The room is pre-wired for immersive audio including Dolby Atmos.

The auxiliary room provides a flexible second space for tracking or overflow sessions. Both rooms feature full acoustical treatment and serious sound isolation — the control room is built room-within-a-room with a floated floor. Tie lines run throughout the facility and into the main barn, enabling recording from virtually anywhere on the property.

The studio has its own separate entrance from the main house and full-duplex audio and video communication between rooms.

2
Treated rooms
18×11
Control room (ft)
32 ch
A/D & D/A conversion
1940s
Original barn structure
The 1940s horse barn exterior at 83 Sturges Highway, Westport
The 1940s horse barn — exterior, before renovation

“This is not a commercial venture; it’s a creative one. The goal is to find musical collaborators right here in our community, and foster songwriting, composing and recording of music.”

Success measured in collaboration & great music — not revenue.

The Person Behind It

Dan Bikel

Dan Bikel
Dan Bikel
Musician & AI Research Scientist
Folk-Pop Soundtracks Classical Guitar Piano Vocals Songwriter Producer

Dan grew up surrounded by music: his mother was a talented amateur classical pianist, and his father a professional folk musician. He started writing music at around age seven — and has never stopped.

Self-taught in guitar, piano/keyboards and singing, Dan has written across many genres but has a particular affinity for folk-pop songs, soundtracks and classical music. He has maintained a home recording studio of some kind for most of his life, immersing himself in every aspect of recording and audio technology.

By day, Dan is an AI research scientist — one of the people who research and build new kinds of large language models and related technology. The studio is the creative counterpoint to that work: a dedicated space to make, share and collaborate on music with the community right outside his door.

Building dB Sound Recording is the realization of a lifelong ambition — a space where the name itself is a small joke: his initials (dB) double as the abbreviation for decibel, and “Sound” carries a second meaning from the Long Island Sound just down the road.

Equipment

The Gear

Workstation & DAWs

  • Mac Studio (high-spec)
  • MOTU Digital Performer (primary DAW)
  • Logic Pro
  • Cubase
  • 32 channels A/D & D/A conversion

Control & Monitoring

  • MUM 10MB monitors (22Hz–22kHz, ±3 dB)
  • Event Precision 8 (35Hz–20kHz, ±3 dB)
  • 17-fader mixing surface (Mackie / SSL)
  • Pre-wired for Dolby Atmos
  • Large video monitor (film/game scoring)

Microphones & Preamps

  • Lauten Audio Eden
  • Audio-Technica AT4050
  • Audio-Technica AT4033
  • Shure SM57
  • Pristine solid-state mic preamps
  • High-end tube-based preamps

Vintage Outboard

  • dbx 166 compressor / noise gate
  • Art MultiVerb
  • DeltaLab Effectron 1 digital delay

MIDI & Controllers

  • StudioLogic SL88GT (main keyboard controller)
  • Extensive MIDI routing
  • Tie lines throughout facility & main barn

Connectivity

  • Full-duplex audio & video comms
  • Separate entrance from main house
  • Tie lines to main barn

Synthesizers — Current & Vintage

  • Nord Grand
  • Roland Juno-106
  • Casio CZ-1
  • Yamaha TX81Z (×2)
  • E-mu Proteus/1XR
  • E-mu UltraProteus

Work With Us

Let’s Make Music

dB Sound Recording is open to collaboration with songwriters, composers and musicians in Westport and the surrounding area. This is a creative space, not a commercial one — the goal is simply to work with interesting people and make great music together. If that sounds like you, reach out.

Get in Touch