MERIDIAN, MS – The First Baptist Church here recently upgraded its sound system with dual Iconyx IC24-R systems, acting on the recommendation made by William Roland, principal at Gracenote Consulting.
"It's a fairly traditional Southern style architecture," Roland said, "and while the space isn't overly reflective, the acoustics were designed with organ and choir in mind."
Roland noted that while the church members, at first, "were reluctant to change the sound of the room" – the acoustics were well-suited to the church's traditional Baptist service of choir, organ and piano – spoken word intelligibility had been lacking.
"The Iconyx provided the intelligibility we were after," he said. "In this case the soundstage really needed to be transparent. They needed a system that would enhance the acoustic performance they already had, without drawing attention to itself."
Two IC24-R systems are installed on either side of the stage, with low frequencies covered by a PN112-SUB. Rather than placing them under or even with the stage, Roland opted to install the sub in the organ chamber. "It's on the low frequency side of the chamber, which is acoustically tuned," he said. "It sounds amazing.
Along with intelligibility, the new system's benefits include musicality and aesthetics, Roland added. "The music always sounded good in the room, and they really weren't expecting any dramatic improvement. Now that they've heard what the Iconyx does for the music, they won't go without it anymore.
"We sent Renkus-Heinz a paint sample and they painted the cabinets to match," Roland noted. "They blend in so well they're practically invisible."
For more information, please visit www.renkus-heinz.com.
