All churches share the common goal of spreading the message. Some have a greater emphasis on spoken word; others rely more on music in any variety of styles, from liturgical to flat-out rock ‘n’ roll. Yet, all houses of worship need a sound system that provides clarity, intelligibility and musicality. With that in mind, we looked at some recent install/upgrade projects.
Princeton University Chapel, Princeton, NJ
The word “chapel” hardly describes the massive 277-foot sanctuary in the style of a medieval gothic cathedral in the center of the Princeton University campus. Yet, it was built to replace a small chapel that was destroyed in a fire in 1920 and retained the “chapel” moniker.
And with its long reverb times, the Princeton University Chapel had long been plagued with poor intelligibility, so during some recent interior restoration, it was decided to design and install a new sound system. That task was assigned to award-winning (TEC and Parnelli) audio and acoustical designer Sam Berkow of SIA Acoustics, who’s also handled projects such as NYC’s Jazz at Lincoln Center, The SFJazz Center (San Francisco), Jazz St. Louis (St. Louis), The Pearl at the Palms (Las Vegas) and many more.
Berkow’s solution for the main vocal P.A. came in the form of Renkus-Heinz Iconyx Live beam steering column speakers — 13 in all, with two 12-foot triple versions next to the pulpit and lectern and 11 of the 8-foot Iconyx doubles on the stone columns. Each connects via a Dante backbone using small-diameter TiniFiber Micro Armor fiber optic cabling, which uses a tightly wrapped stainless steel coil combined with Kevlar for protection, while accommodating any tight bend radius. Custom-colored, these invisibly reach down to speakers from the ceiling 80-100 feet above.
“Renkus-Heinz Iconyx Live work really well,” says Berkow. “Careful angle selection and alignment really are the keys. We ended up aiming the triples at the front further back than we had originally thought, but the image really comes from the front of the room and the sound is very natural and clear.”
After ensuring that the fiber cabling was nearly undetectable, “we offered to encase the speakers in a stone look, photo-printed scrim fabric or have them painted,” Berkow explains. “The choice to stay black was made by a team from the facility.” However, this may change as “most of the stretched fabric panel installers and fabric houses like Rose Brand, FabriTRAK and others offer both pre-printed and custom-printed scrim fabrics,” which could be added at a future date.
Yet this is only part of the story. While 28 of the large vintage lighting fixtures were taken down for restoration, custom speaker mounts were designed to conceal down-firing Fulcrum Acoustic speakers within. Some 22 fixtures were fitted for Fulcrum RX599 with 5” coaxial drivers for overhead and rear area reinforcement. Another six lights above the choir seating had 8” model CX-826 coaxials, to be employed as choir monitors.
“Designed to enhance choral singing, musical performances and select spoken word events, these overhead loudspeakers will enhance the main sound system,” Berkow notes, “provide additional envelopment and — when desired — adding an immersive element to the sound.”
Other system improvements included: Allen & Heath Avantis console in HSA roll-top wood enclosure and A&H DT168 Dante stagebox; QSC Q-SYS Core 510i 256×256 DSP for loudspeaker control/alignment; four QSC CX-Q 4K8 amplifiers; six dBTechnologies DVX DM 28 wedge monitors; Audix, DPA, Earthworks and Shure mics; Clear-Com intercoms; and a Listen Technologies assisted listening system.
Commenting the day after the unveiling, Berkow was pleased with the outcome. “Achieving intelligible speech is hard in these spaces,” he explains, “while adding the requirement for tonally balanced and enveloping music requires a significant design and system tuning effort. And working in a historic space not designed with cable runs in mind presents lots of challenges, but it was all worth it. Yesterday was really amazing!”
Princeton University Chapel
- Capacity: 2,000
- Key Products: Renkus-Heinz Iconyx Live; Fulcrum Acoustic Compact Coaxials
- Integrator: Washington Professional Systems
- Designer: Sam Berkow, SIA Acoustics
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NewPointe Community Church, Dover, OH
Technology and spirituality can create a transformative experience. Recently, this potential has been realized at the Dover campus of NewPointe Community Church with the integration of d&b’s Soundscape spatial and augmented acoustics solution. The Dover campus broadcasts its services to five other campuses, providing a cohesive multisite worship experience.
NewPointe Community Church is a non-denominational church that draws a weekly congregation of 2,000 people at its main campus. The largest and most modern church in the area, NewPointe offers an engaging worship experience. On average, its six campuses attract 4,000 worshippers over two weekly services, a number that has seen steady growth since the end of the pandemic.
The church’s production experience director, Ben Abbott, approached Cleveland-area integrator MediaNet AV about upgrading their existing large-format line array system. Tasked with the job, MediaNet head of installation Alex Earnhardt identified some design improvements. In addition to the age of the existing P.A., this paved the way for a new modern audio design, with Earnhardt proposing the Soundscape system as the ideal technology to meet their requirements.
After a live demo in Pittsburgh, Abbott recognized this system could provide the worship experience the church desired. Earnhardt stated that implementing the Soundscape system along with 24S and 44S point-source speakers presented no significant challenges due to the ease of rigging, predictability and accuracy of the system components. The 24S was chosen for mains as a high-performance, full range 2-way speaker with its two 12-inch woofers in a dipole arrangement for directivity control. The ultracompact point source 44S, with its recessed flush-mount option, was chosen for the front fill system.
The d&b audiotechnik system includes: seven 24S-D point sources for mains, 12 44S for front fills, eight Bi6 in a flown SUB array, five 10S-D for delays, four 8S for lateral enhancement, a DS100 signal engine with En-Scene processing, two DS10 Dante network bridges, five 40D amplifiers and three 5D amplifiers.
Soundscape optimizes speaker performance, adding fidelity and headroom throughout the space. It reduces the burden on the mix engineer and delivers a superior listening experience for the entire congregation while maintaining clear sightlines. Soundscape’s flexibility for system design enables extending the system beyond the stage, bringing the congregation closer to the worship up to 360 degrees through additional loudspeakers. The 180+ configuration implemented at NewPointe utilizes lateral speakers to extend the system into the congregation.
Abbott highlighted the transformative impact of Soundscape in the worship environment. “The Soundscape system stands out in the church world, while most P.A. systems resemble rock shows, bombarding you with sound from the front with little to no spatial awareness. When we embarked on this project, our primary objective was to enhance the worship experience. Soundscape, with its immersive technology, combined with engaging video content and lighting, plays a pivotal role in realizing that vision.”
NewPointe Community Church
- Capacity: 1,400
- Key Components: d&b Soundscape system
- Integrator: MediaNet AV
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Grace Kwangsung Church, Seoul, Korea
A new church in Gangdong-gu, Seoul reached for a new standard for house of worship sound by installing an Electro-Voice speaker system powered by Dynacord amplifiers. The newly constructed Grace Kwangsung Church features a modern multi-purpose design and needed an equally versatile sound system to accommodate the services, worship meetings, church events and concerts that take place there. And, of course, the top priority was to ensure the utmost clarity and uniform coverage for the congregation during church services.
Won Young Kim, Kim Jin Keuk and Kim Ho Jun of Electro-Voice and Dynacord’s parent company Bosch worked with regional dealer and integrator dB Sound Interactive and the church leaders to specify a solution to precisely address their performance and budget requirements, all with the highest level of technical support. After running a simulation with PREVIEW loudspeaker software to determine a model selection providing optimal coverage, SPL and frequency response characteristics, a system design was finalized. The result is a state-of-the-art solution that combines exceptional acoustic performance with low-profile, architecture-friendly aesthetics.
Six Electro-Voice X1-212/120 line-arrays and two X12-125F flying subwoofers per side serve as the main system, with one EVC-1122-VI variable-intensity model for precise center fill. Four ultra-compact EVU-1082/95 and eight FRI-2082 loudspeakers serve as fills for the over/under balcony areas. The system is powered by a combination of one IPX10:8, one TGX20 and two TGX10 power amplifiers from Dynacord — all controlled and monitored via SONICUE sound system Software. Powered loudspeakers also play a key role at the church, with eight compact PXM-12MP coaxial powered monitors providing on-stage sound and ZLX-BT models on-hand for portable P.A. support.
The system achieves the requisite high-resolution for spoken word, the flexibility for various community events and the high-output capacity for concert sound. In addition to the audio aspect, the system’s low-profile aesthetics keep sightlines open and complement the church’s architecture.
“The system has delivered exactly what we wanted — we are very happy” says Mr. Park, executive pastor at Grace Kwangsung Church. “It’s amazing,” adds audio engineer Mr. Kim: “The system gives us great coverage throughout the church and with SONICUE, I can monitor and control the system easily and effectively.” Mr. Kim of dB Sound Interactive is equally pleased with the results: “The X1 arrays are a solution we can trust to provide coverage from the front to the back of the hall. We didn’t even use processing at first and it still sounded fantastic. Many thanks to the Bosch team for technical support and advice on this project.”
Grace Kwangsung Church
- Key Components: E-V X1-212/120 line-arrays
- Integrator: dB Sound Interactive
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Calvary Church, Dover DE
Calvary Church is one of a new generation of worship facilities, with young and vibrant leadership and a congregation inspired by the power of music. The church’s music team has long delivered a powerful accompaniment to their services, with a gentle, melodic touch and just enough rock ‘n’ roll to give it a compelling edge.
With the church’s sound system growing a bit long in the tooth, the church elders approached Central Pennsylvania-based A2B Media to design and implement a new audio system worthy of the church’s music, musicians, and message. As A2B Media founder Alex Beitzel explains, the choice of DAS Audio for the venue’s sound system was an obvious one.
“The sanctuary itself is pretty wide, and we needed a system that could deliver even coverage and consistent SPL across the entire seating area,” Beitzel reports. “We’ve had great experience with the DAS Audio ARTEC series in particular, and we were confident it was the right system for this space.”
The system is based around left and right arrays of seven DAS Audio Artec 320 two-way dual 10-inch cabinets per side, augmented by four ARTEC 306 cabinets and a pair of ARTEC 326 two-way systems to cover front and side seating. A single DAS Audio ARTEC 310.64 compact two-way cabinet completes the system and assures consistent coverage to every seat in the house. Ashly amplification powers the system, with Danley DSP providing system drive and processing.
Outside at the church’s entry, five DAS Audio ARCO 24T compact, weather-resistant two-way systems welcome congregants, and along with four more ARCO 4T systems they provide music and sermons outside the main sanctuary building.
Osi Emeribenini, the church’s Technical Director, reports that feedback from both parishioners and church staff has been overwhelming. “We’ve had people coming up to us after the service, telling us how great the music sounds, and how they can hear the sermons so much more clearly now. It’s really been a night and day difference.”
“We were able to replace Calvary’s aging, patchwork system with a DAS Audio system that looks and sounds amazing,” offers Beitzel. “It’s really a win for both the church and for the congregation.”
Calvary Church
- Key Components: DAS Audio Artec 320
- Integrator: A2B Media
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Elevation Church, Charlotte, NC
An Evangelical Baptist multi-site megachurch, Charlotte, NC-based Elevation Church averages approximately 26,000 attendees with multiple campuses in different cities, and 65,000 more attending on the church’s online platform. A new 1,800-seat main sanctuary in Charlotte’s Ballantyne neighborhood was dedicated in 2016.
After facing a variety of audio problems — mainly vocal clarity as well as gain before feedback within the room and near the wedges, the church’s audio director Justin Whisnant tackled the challenge with multiple DPA solutions. For broadcast events, the church pastor utilizes wireless d:facto vocal capsules, along with a 6066 subminiature headset microphone. Model 2011C Compact Cardioid and 4055 kick drum mics are trusted for recording projects, both live and in the studio; a 4017B shotgun serves as a crowd mic and the new 2012 Compact Cardioid and 2015 Compact Wide Cardioid Mics amplify the church’s B3 organ. DPA’s acclaimed 4099 instrument mics can be found on drums and — especially during Easter and Christmas services — on horns and strings.
“DPA microphones are just so easy to work with,” says Whisnant. “They give us the clarity and response we are looking for — whether we’re recording, doing live mixes or streaming online. The d:facto and 6066 have been great mics for our Pastor. We are able to get his handheld loud and stable in the wedges without a lot of work. His headset has also allowed us to keep his mic loud enough in front of the P.A. without any feedback. Then, for our pop-up church setup, the 4099s and 4055 make it possible to get a great mix quickly and easily.”
Elevation Church
- Capacity: 1,800
- Key Components: DPA Microphones
- Integrator: In-house
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