Sound system designers for the house of worship market face some tough challenges. By their very nature, churches — whether traditional or modern — are often not designed for the sonic needs of today’s high-SPL worship and frequently built into acoustical spaces such as storefronts or warehouses that were never intended for music appreciation. At the same time, church services typically combine a wealth of spoken word portions that require superb intelligibility with music that can range from delicate instrumentation and quiet vocal solos intended to go with quiet contemplative moments to turn-it-up-to-10 hymns that instill the soul (and the sanctuary itself) with the sounds of praise.
Another issue arises from facility tech personnel that can vary from a few volunteers to a full-on professional crew. And here, the system designer may be faced with finding the balance between matching the complex technical requirements of some services and a providing an easy-to-use rig that can be managed by non-technical members.
We looked into recent house of worship audio installations (both entire system and incremental upgrades). Each took a different route in their approach to making sure the word, the music and the message comes through clearly and cleanly to all parishioners, whether seated near the altar or in last row.
Epic Church, Decatur, AL
At Epic Church in Decatur, AL, worship pastor Justin Barnett brought in a DiGiCo S21 digital console, purchased through Sutherland Sight & Sound of nearby Sheffield, AL, which let him set the console up in the church’s 1,000-seat sanctuary before the purchase was made and let church leaders and volunteers familiarize themselves with the desk.
“We knew we needed an upgrade,” Barnett explains. “We needed more adaptability and flexibility, to let us use the console for front of house, for monitors, for streaming. We wanted a better-sounding console and were ready to take the next step.”
The compact S21 operates with 96k Hz clarity and incorporates features such as 40 Flexi input channels, 16 Flexi aux/sub-group buses, a 10×8 full processing matrix, four dynamic EQ’s, four assignable multiband compressors, 16 assignable graphic EQ’s, eight digital FX and optional Waves integration.
Perhaps equally important, the S21 provided a seamless transition from the church’s analog past to its digital future. Having features such as multiband EQ and effects processing integrated into its onboard arsenal convinced the technical team there, while a combination of affordability, ease of use and great sound sold church leaders on it.
“When he heard it, our lead pastor said, ‘We’re going to buy it’,” Barnett recalls. “Once they saw and heard the console, it pretty much sold itself.”
Inside Epic Church
- Capacity: 1,000
- Key Components: DiGiCo S21
- Integrator: Sutherland Sight & Sound (Sheffield, AL)
Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church, Atlanta, GA
Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church of Atlanta, GA, recently added a new Eastern Acoustic Works Redline sound reinforcement system to its sanctuary. The church leaders, who are planning a complete sanctuary renovation in the next few years, were looking for an audio solution that would meet their immediate needs and could be repurposed in the future.
With that goal in mind, they contacted Atlanta-based AEE Productions, to assess the situation. “A high-quality, portable system like Redline provides a powerful sound that doesn’t bottom out and provides the vocal clarity needed for a sanctuary,” explains AEE Productions president Yergan Jones. “Because it is portable and self-powered, it has versatility and the ability to be used in any number of applications the church might have in the future.”
Based on these needs, Jones recommended four RL12 loudspeakers and two RL18S subwoofers. The main system consists of the RL12s pole mounted on top of the RL18s, located to the left and right of the stage. The RL12s are used as monitors in the pit.
“The RL12 have tremendous vocal clarity,” adds Jones. “The RL18S subs really resonate the musical instruments. It’s a winning combination for the church, which will be extremely useful for years to come.”
The RL12’s Beamwidth-Matched crossovers on 90 x 60 degree user-rotatable horns offer even, consistent directivity. Four aperture ports provide turbulence-free bass support, while maximizing transducer-cooling airflow for rock-solid reliability.
The self-powered loudspeakers feature 1,250 watts of fanless Class-D, Power Factor Corrected amplification. EAW Focusing sonic processing delivers precise impulse response with the impact required by live sound applications, while EAW’s exclusive DynO processing maximizes sound quality at a high SPLs. And to simplify the operational experience, three user-defined voicing options to match different needs, without need of a computer or external processor.
The RL18S subwoofer is cardioid-ready — accessible via simple rear-panel controls, so users can optimize low-frequency control without the need for complex processing or calculations.
“The church is quite happy with the new system,” concludes Jones. “The congregation noticed the improvement immediately. It’s the perfect fit for their needs.”
Inside Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church
- Capacity: Approximately 1,000
- Key Components: EAW Redline System
- Integrator: AEE Productions (Atlanta, GA)
Covenant Church, Carrollton, TX
Dallas area-based Covenant Church recently installed a large L-Acoustics K2 system. But the story of how this growing organization of five church campuses (now all fitted with L-Acoustics speakers) goes back five years.
Covenant’s primary location is the Carrollton campus, which includes a 1,850-seat auditorium that regularly plays host to the A-list of contemporary Christian artists, including Kari Jobe and Jesus Culture. But Covenant has four other campuses spread across two states — all fitted with L-Acoustics systems.
“All of our campuses used speakers from another manufacturer for a long time,” says Covenant’s media director Slade Goplin. “But we started having issues with a lot of them failing and on top of that, we sometimes waited months for repairs and replacements.”
So, as Covenant expanded, they began seeking a different vendor. “Right from the beginning, the L-Acoustics team was great,” Goplin remembers. “They flew us out to California and demoed Kara, their newest system at the time and really explained the approach and technology. We were sold right away.”
Covenant has since gone with all L-Acoustics systems — a mixture of Kara, Kiva and ARCS WiFo systems appropriate to the size and mission of each location. When plans to upgrade the Carrollton location began, Goplin and his crew went with a touring-sized solution for the 1,850-seat sanctuary. In total, the system has 18 K2, six SB28 subs, two ARCS Wide for fill and eight X8 front fills. The system, provided by Onstage Systems, is powered by six LA8 amplified controllers, plus a pair of LA4X for the front fills.
“Our main auditorium is kind of an awkward room with balconies,” Goplin notes. “With the new system, I wanted something where the line arrays covered everything really well so we didn’t have to use a bunch of delays like we had in the past. The K2s cover everything — the balconies, the back of the room, the front of the room, everything.”
L-Acoustics’ K2 provided both coverage and intelligibility — two must-haves for a house of worship setting — and plenty of horsepower. “When we do conferences, we run as loud as any rock show. We needed a system that could do regular services, but also get up and run when we needed it to,” Goplin adds. “And we definitely have that capability with the K2s.”
Inside Covenant Church
- Capacity: 1,850
- Key Components: L-Acoustics K2 system, Avid VENUE D-Show
- Integrator: Onstage Systems (Dallas, TX)
St. Gabriel’s Church, Austin, TX
St Gabriel’s is a Catholic School with a growing attendance thanks to the booming Austin, TX economy. Facing space limitations, the school built a new building that extended an existing building, providing more classroom space, a large lecture hall, a library, teacher meeting space, a remodeled gym and a new chapel.
Ridge AV was contacted to integrate audio and video into the school environment. The expectations were high and rather complex, but the systems had to be extremely user friendly.
“One the most challenging projects we’ve ever taken on was the Learning Stairs Lecture Hall and Chapel,” says Ridge president Mark Tarbet. “These are ornate spaces where the AV system simply could not be visible or stand out. The speakers in both spaces could not be flown and could not be slightly. All we could mount speakers on were custom, hand painted stained-glass windows. To make it extra challenging and risky, both stained-glass walls were 100 percent custom built onsite by Italian craftsmen flown in for this project. No errors; no replacements!”
The Learning Stairs is a lecture hall made up of large wood-stained stairs. Up to 175 students can be seated in this space. It is also used for large meetings. The small 50-seat chapel is used for mass.
Ridge’s solution came in the form of RCF’s VSA Series speakers — vertical steerable line arrays that are just 5-inches wide. These can be programmed to direct the sound specifically at the listeners, avoiding intelligibility losses from reflections and reverberation created by the glass and hard surfaces
Ridge AV fabricated custom mounts to attach the speakers to the window mullions and worked with RCF to get a good color match. The end result exceeded all expectations.
After installation, Ridge AV invited some of the school staff to come in the spaces to “find the speakers” and initially, no one could. But invisibility aside, the sound quality was great thanks to the speaker’s configurable steering capability. ’We were able to mount the speakers rather high up (less noticeable) and span elevated stair seating to get sound cleanly where it needed to be,” noted Tarbet.
Inside St. Gabriel’s Catholic School
- Capacity: 50 in chapel; 175 in Lecture Hall
- Key Components: RCF VSA System
- Integrator: Ridge AV (Cedar Park, TX)
StoneBridge Christian Church, Omaha, NE
A new build at the site of a former outlet store, the Millard Campus of Omaha’s StoneBridge Christian Church is focused around a worship space in a rectangular 50 by 80 foot room. The answer for the unique space of the room came in the form of a Martin Audio CDD system installed by CCI Solutions of Olympia, WA.
“It’s an unusual space with a corner-loaded stage and a low ceiling with lots of HVAC structural equipment that slopes down from 19 feet to about 17 feet at the back of the seating area. As the stage is in the corner of this long room, we had an extended throw down the long wall, a short throw to the wall on the other side and another throw to the opposite corner where FOH is located,” explains CCI project lead Mike Sessler.
This created a real challenge to cover the audience evenly from front to back and side-to-side and in the FOH area. “That’s why we ended up with two Martin Audio CDD12’s located directly above the center of the stage in a split mono cluster with another CDD12 located close to the center, about two-thirds of the way back in the room.” The system also includes a Bose RoomMatch system for amps and processing.
“The two CDD12’s are flown above the front of the stage on either side of two CSX218 subs located in the center,” Sessler explains, “with one CDD12 going up the long side, one going across the short side and the third for back fill and coverage of FOH.”
Asked about the resulting coverage, Sessler added “as an internal design standard, we shoot for no worse than ± 3 dB throughout the seating area and we try to get that in the ± 2 to ± 2.5 range which we did with CDD and the coverage is very even. You walk around the room and there’s little difference. Everyone is pleased with the coverage and audio quality, and the amount of low-end we can get is staggering.”
The sound system for the worship space needed to be flexible in terms of both spoken word and music reproduction. “We run audio about 90 dB and the music is full spectrum (keys, guitar, acoustic drums, bass, vocals), so we had to have a P.A. that could reinforce the band in a small room without the volume getting out of control. That was non-negotiable,” according Millard campus tech pastor Scott McCord.
Summing up, Sessler concludes, “Because of CDD’s asymmetrical pattern, we don’t need as many delay boxes as we used to. We can get that wide coverage up front and still keep the coverage off the walls as we go back, especially if we have ceiling height.”
“The Martin Audio CDD line has become our go-to small venue speaker for systems integration,” explains Duke DeJong, CCI’s VP of systems integration. “And with its asymmetrical coverage it gives us the really tight and accurate coverage we demand out of every design we do. We couldn’t be happier with Martin Audio CDD.”
Inside StoneBridge Christian Church
- Capacity: Approximately 200
- Key Components: Martin Audio CDD System, Bose RoomMatch Amps/Processing
- Integrator: CCI Solutions (Olympia, WA)
Mother of God Catholic Church, Covington, KY
A combination of non-interference with church aesthetics and clear, audio reproduction were both on the list for the sonic upgrade at the Mother of God Catholic Church in Covington, KY. For this project, the solution came in the form of Meyer Sound’s CAL column array loudspeakers.
Mounted snugly in niches flanking the altar, custom color-matched CAL 96 loudspeakers virtually disappear within the sanctuary’s classic 19th century Italian Renaissance Revival architecture.
Design for the church’s audio renewal was entrusted to consultant David Walters of Stan Roller and Associates. His plan called for acoustical treatment of the rear wall to eliminate slap echoes and replacement of ungainly custom loudspeaker boxes — dubbed “the refrigerators” because of their bulk and profile — with a beam-steering column solution.
“I presented three options for loudspeaker columns, with Meyer Sound as the premium option,” explains Walters. “Here, I must give credit to Cindy Duesing (director of the church’s 14-member contemporary music ensemble) who headed the committee, because she pushed hard for the best solution. Musically, the CALs sound just stupendous. In fact, this is probably the best column array room I’ve ever done.”
Programmed in a split beam configuration, the top segment of 64 drivers employs a 10° vertical beam to cover the middle and rear sections, throwing nearly 100’ to the back pew, while the bottom 32 drivers project a 20° beam to uniformly cover the front sections. Intelligibility proves excellent, considering the extremely reverberant acoustics, with Walters reporting Speech Transmission Index readings of 0.65 or better throughout the seating area for about 600.
“We are thrilled with what we are hearing now,” says Duesing. “For the first time we can really hear each other. Now we can distinguish individual voices and instruments — instead of hearing mush.”
Inside Mother of God Catholic Church
- Capacity: Approximately 600
- Key Components: Meyer Sound CAL System
- Designer: David Walters of Stan Roller and Associates (Naperville, IL)
- Integrator: George Smith, Smithall Electronics (Cincinnati, OH)
Lovers Lane United Methodist Church, Dallas, TX
With its soaring glass walls and 36-foot ceiling, Lovers Lane United Methodist Church is the largest freestanding stained glass structure in North America. Although the church’s main sanctuary is a thing of significant architectural beauty, its design presents acoustical challenges, with large glass and hard surfaces creating a reverberant chamber that wreaks havoc with intelligibility.
“We couldn’t do anything to impact the sanctuary’s unique aesthetics, therefore a ceiling-hung line array was not an option,” explains Shawn Slocum of Ford Audio-Video. “The previous loudspeaker system approach, installed in the late 1990s, included large-format point source loudspeakers recessed into the ceiling, front fills in the forward organ towers and a pew back system to fill in the outer seating areas,” says Slocum. “After looking at several alternatives, we determined that the same approach would be utilized. The challenge was how to improve intelligibility and SPL using the existing design.”
The solution came in the form of Fulcrum Acoustic’s AH-Series horn-loaded loudspeakers. “The previous point source speakers were medium-long throw systems, but lacked the tight pattern control the space required, particularly in the mid and low-mid frequency range,” says Slocum. “The AH 65’s 60 x 45 degree pattern covers the seating area but ends just inside the angular side walls, limiting early reflections and improving intelligibility.”
The pew back system added coverage for the far outside seats, while a pair of Fulcrum Acoustic US212 subs were installed in the front organ towers, adding low-frequency reinforcement that the sanctuary had never previously experienced.
“The new system delivers a marked improvement in both intelligibility and frequency response for parishioners seated in both the main floor and balcony areas,” Slocum reports, adding that the next phase of the project will include several Fulcrum DX896 loudspeakers to provide greater forward imaging for the front third of the main floor. “The new system has already made a dramatic difference, and will be even better when the front fills are installed next year.”
Inside Lovers Lane United Methodist Church
- Capacity: 900
- Key Components: Fulcrum Acoustic AH-Series
- Integrator: Ford Audio-Video (Irving, TX)
