For years, the church battled with a poor monitoring system that did not effectively meet the needs of the musicians and singers in the worship band. Frustrated musicians complained that they could not hear themselves while the volunteer audio staff said the musicians' high monitor volumes made mixing for the congregation impossible.
As part of an upgrade to its monitoring setup, the church moved to an Aviom personal mixing system, installed by First Live Sound Sdn Bhd and supplied by Coda Audio Services Pte, to help overcome the challenges. With the Aviom Personal Mixers in place, members of the worship band can now hear themselves clearly because they have the ability to create their own personal monitor mixes, and with on-stage volume under control, audio staff can mix more effectively for the congregation.
"With the Aviom Personal Mixers, the sound quality at front of house is greatly improved at a much lower volume," says audio visual director Brother Kok Hon. "The members can now hear themselves singing together as a congregation with the band, and that lends itself well to a very uplifting worship experience."
Signals from all the instruments and mics on stage are fed into the front of house console, a Yamaha LS9. An Aviom AN-16/I Input Module takes analogue signals from the LS9 and outputs a digital audio stream. The digital signal is then sent via Cat 5 to an A-16D Pro A-Net Distributor situated near the stage which sends monitor stems via Cat 5 to four A-16II Personal Mixers located on the stage. Musicians use the mixers to control the monitor mix in their headphones or in-the-ear monitors.
"Seeing the value and the sound quality that we get from the Aviom gear, we will soon get rid of all the stage wedge monitors and upgrade all our singers to wireless in-ear monitors connected to Aviom Personal Mixers," says Hon.
(Jim Evans)
