ORLANDO, FL – Its 800-seat facility may have been big enough to land Church in the Son on the Orlando Weekly's roster of "mega churches." But it wasn't big enough for the burgeoning congregation, even with three Sunday services. Then, a church member donated a vacant building lot adjacent to the church, and the path toward expansion became clear.
"They decided to build a 1,600 seat venue, allowing the ‘old' sanctuary to become a dedicated children and youth sanctuary, which could comfortably accommodate the church's high number of youngsters," said Gil Parente of Entertainment Arts, an Orlando-based technology design and installation specialist.
Church in the Son's technical director also made it readily apparent that the church was going to put a large priority on the new audio system. "From the beginning," Parente said, "it was decided that for the new building, there would be no compromise in the audio system."
Church of the Son opted for a d&b audiotechnik loudspeaker system, in a decision made by Entertainment Arts and the church, but with input also from d&b's sales partner, Carlton Audio Services, based in Davie, Fla.
"Products were selected from the outcome of a listening test that we set up in an existing room the church had available for a demo," noted Carlton Audio Services' Chris Carlton. "The quantity, placement, and array angles for the proposed system design were developed jointly. The Entertainment Arts team had a good handle on this from the start; we merely added a few guiding comments," Carlton said.
"The message and worship experience was the central concern, and it could not be diminished by poor intelligibility or an intrusive and visually obvious sound system," noted Entertainment Arts' Parente. "Church in the Son is a longtime and loyal customer, and we put all our efforts into designing a system that would fit both the budget and the vision of the church."
Of the 1,600 seats, close to 900 are on the floor, 500 are on the balcony, and the remaining 200 are situated to the side by the stairs to the balcony.
The main sound system is comprised of d&b audiotechnik Qi-Series line array loudspeakers for uniform full-bandwidth coverage of the entire room with E3s for the front fills, all driven by D12 amplifiers. The glass side walls to the sanctuary were the only unhelpful surfaces, acoustically speaking, but as Carlton explained, "the precise horizontal Q of the d&b Qi loudspeaker system was able to avoid them quite nicely."
A major concern from the Church Construction Committee was the appearance of the system. They wanted to be sure that the hanging loudspeaker arrays would not be distracting or obtrusive in time of worship.
The solution, as Parente noted, was easy. "The hardware provided for the Qi-Series comes in matching colors and made the array visually very discreet. We placed a thick black velour curtain immediately behind the arrays, which provided for both visual and acoustic improvements."
The positioning of J-SUBS for low frequency propagation also had to be done with the eye as well as the ear in mind. As Carlton explained, "subwoofers were not allowed on the floor, so they have been hung in the center of the left and right arrays. Aimed about 45 degrees down, the inherent cardioid pattern of the J-SUBs achieved a fantastically even coverage front to back. In combination, the clarity of the Q-Series system and directional capabilities of the J-SUBs have helped optimize intelligibility and kept the sonic spectrum linear throughout the venue including the stage."
The end result has exceeded both main demands in terms of visual impact and sound quality. For a church that has been described by the weekly paper as the warmest and friendliest church in the neighborhood, that is of paramount concern.
"All of Church in The Son's dreams have been accomplished, and for us at Entertainment Arts, that means mission accomplished," Parente concluded.
For more information, please visit www.dbaudio.com, www.carltonaudio.com and www.eartsinc.com.
