The congregation of St. Columb's recently moved into their new facility. The sanctuary itself is traditional in appearance, with high ceilings and large, ornate stained glass windows, but with a few contemporary touches. Along with the new building came a new sound system, installed by Josh Sanders from Players Audio Video of Jackson, MS.
Being traditional in design, the room has a fairly live acoustical signature, which can spell trouble for amplified sound. So right from the start, Renkus-Heinz Iconyx IC24R Digitally Steerable Arrays were specified as the main loudspeaker system, providing the ability to precisely steer and control coverage of the sound.
Richard Hembree of Atlanta-based Griffith Sales performed the on-site system alignment. Hembree credits the consultant and the church leadership for their decision to budget for and install a speaker system that would take into consideration the acoustical requirements of the sanctuary.
"When I went to commission the system and saw the size of the room and the live acoustics, I was thankful that the consultant and the church had made the right decision," he says. "Even though a pair of IC16-Rs would have performed 'well enough' for many, they opted for excellence by specifying a pair of IC24s instead. The IC24s allowed me to gain control over the problematic lower mid frequencies in this style of sanctuary. I was able to shoot the sound right over the pulpit and altar, covering front to rear of the pews with less than a 2dB variance in SPL."
(Jim Evans)
