ATLANTA – The private Lovett School, established in 1926, has some 1,400 students in grades K-12, and recently raised $55 million in funding for a new middle school. A 500-seat multi-purpose room, part of that project, is designed to serve as an assembly space and indoor rec area, and was equipped with Danley loudspeakers.
Newcomb & Boyd designed the AV system, and AV engineer (and Lovett alumnus) Josef H. Henschen chose the gear for the space.
"The multipurpose room is a pretty decent compromise between a gym and a performance space," Henschen said. "But still, we were presented with an acoustical challenge. It has a hardwood floor. One sidewall is plain concrete block. Another is ceramic brick. The third is treated with acoustical block, while the fourth is mostly obscured by retractable bleachers. The ceiling is covered with perforated paneling. Even with the treatment, the space still sounds much more like a gym than it does a theater."
The Danley loudspeakers and subwoofers include two flown Danley SH-50s for the bulk of the main coverage, a pair of Danley SH-95s, which hang below the SH-50s for front-fill and down-fill, and a single Danley TH-50 subwoofer directly behind the cluster with its grill facing downward to provide a deep low-end.
Ten wired mic inputs and two wireless mics feed the Danleys. They are all mixed and processed by a pair of ClearOne Converge SR 1212 automated digital mixers before being sent to a modest bank of Crown CTS amplifiers.
The video side of the system includes three laptop inputs, a multimedia lectern with a document camera and a Blu-Ray player. A Digital Projections 10,000 lumens projector hits a 240-inch screen for display of prerecorded material.
"I had read a lot about Danley's history in the trade magazines and knew they had a reputation for designing uniquely functional loudspeakers," said Henschen. "In addition to the desire to support a local Georgia business, I was curious to hear these Danley boxes in action for myself. So we went with the Danleys."
Danley touts the "well-defined beam widths" of its Synergy Horn technology for being well-suited to the space, and Henschen concurred.
"I am impressed by how even the coverage is, despite the challenging acoustical environment," he said. "It's not the sort of thing I'm used to hearing in a system like this. The entire audio spectrum is incredibly smooth across the space. And those Danley boxes are efficient! During the inspection, I had to turn attenuate the downfill to keep from blowing the first few rows away."
For more information, please visit www.danleysoundlabs.com.
