Located at the spot where Aston Villa FC was founded in 1874, the new church building features the latest energy saving features and lighting and sound systems in the airy, spacious auditorium. Audio engineer Rowen Spence is a member of the congregation and so was well placed to advise church leaders on the sound specification.
Installed by the Birmingham-based Cloud One Group, the audio system comprises a Yamaha M7CL-48, a Nexo GeoS PA system (comprising S8 and S12 cabinets) with Martin Audio wedge monitors. System control is by a Symnet system, with a touch control panel at the side of the M7CL.
"The church needed a system that was modern, but easy enough for the volunteer technical team to use," says Spence. "It also had to be rider-friendly, because the building is also used for other functions. It needed to be a console that someone coming in from outside could use fairly easily."
Currently the M7CL is used for mixing both front of house and monitors, but with an eye to the future a monitors split was included onstage, to allow the subsequent purchase of a dedicated monitor console, if required.
"One advantage of the console is that we can tweak an existing scene for a particular requirement and then save that as a new scene for when we need the system set up like that again," says Spence.
"And it's extremely useful that incoming engineers who are using the system for other functions can programme their shows offline and load them, via a USB stick, in seconds. We can then, of course, instantly recall our own settings afterwards."
(Jim Evans)
