About Us

Sanctuary Sound is really just a newer, much improved and more beautiful incarnation of Producer/Engineer Richard Cooke's former 'Raw Spirit Studio's, which operated successfully for 15 years based in Melbourne Victoria. "My dream was to design and build an artistic and ecologically sustainable production facility set in secluded and diverse native forest".

Richard is also a passionate singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and performer, who is passionate about supporting other artists to manifest their creative dreams. His previous studio features releases from a wide variety of well-known and developing artists from around Australia and overseas.

Whilst holding a tertiary diploma in Sound Engineering from RMIT University, Richard also has a degree in Fine Art and likes to apply that same sense of composition in his production and mixing work.

"In all my studio work, my aim is to maintain the highest sonic quality through each step of the recording and mixing process".

An acoustically balanced purpose built production facility, high quality microphones, class A microphone pre-amplification, German built RME A/D analogue to digital conversion and mixing on high end 'Neumann', Acoustic Energy' and 'JBL' monitoring is fundamental in achieving this objective.

Combining these fundamentals along with many years of constant development of engineering and production skills is the key difference Sanctuary Sound offers beyond a home studio.

We are also very supportive with helping artist complete as much tracking as they are able from their own facilities and completing their projects to a higher level at SS. This may start with live drum tracking at SS and then later on with key final overdubs such as vocals and with the final mixing/mastering process. Richard is often employed by small/home studios as a trainer and consultant in setting up, running and designing acoustical modifications for home recording. There is now a huge range of digital software and instrument libraries for developing in house instrumentation without the expensive cost of always hiring session musicians. SS has an extensive library of these tools/samples to help you achieve quality recordings and production.