Colorado church switches to TW AUDiO
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While the style of worship practised at the church had changed over the years to fully embrace musical celebration including live performances and playback, the aging sound system was no longer fit for purpose, having been originally designed for more traditional spoken word sermons. Determined to transform not just the sound quality but the overall experience of the congregation, the church’s leadership began the search for a solution.
The new system needed to deliver audio quality and flexibility without requiring any major construction changes to the church itself - a challenge that was given to regional systems integrator Equalized Productions where manager and project engineer Chris Malmgren opted for TW AUDiO ELLA.
“The church’s goal was to bring their ageing system forward to meet modern worship standards as well as improve on the quality of all aspects of worship production,” explains Mick Whelan of TW AUDiO USA. “Meanwhile, the architectural design of St Andrew UMC is inspirational, and it was essential that nothing in the sanctuary distract from the impact of that visual experience. A custom acoustical cloud is suspended above the altar and the audio system must blend with this structure as effortlessly as possible, evolving, not standing away from it. Colour matching was essential.”
Working closely with the TW AUDiO engineering team in Germany, Equalized Productions set about creating a system design that would ultimately not just meet the expectations of St Andrew United Methodist Church, but exceed them. In particular, the team invested a great deal of time into accurate planning and implementation in order to achieve truly even coverage side to side and front to back, despite heavy restrictions on where loudspeakers would be positioned due to available support and the church’s décor.
The completed solution now comprises two hangs of eight cardioid ELLA6 elements per side flown in a L-R configuration which addresses the room’s irregular shape, plus a single M8 for side-fill and a cardioid subwoofer centre-hang of one S32i. Power for the system is courtesy of two Powersoft Quattrocanali 8804 Dante + DSP amplifiers.
“The system has exceeded my highest expectations; I couldn’t be happier,” reports Senior Pastor Reverend Mark Feldmeir, while Executive Director Lana Banbury adds that within weeks of beginning to use its new ELLA system, the church “noticed that the use of assistive listening devices by the congregation fell to just about zero”.
