Fundamentals of Good Sound and How to Get Good Sound in your Church or Auditorium

Whether you’re a church, a school or some other type of auditorium achieving good sound can be difficult depending on the space. Understanding the steps to take in how to have good sound is essential. At Excel AV Group we look at several factors for our clients. Here are the basics:

Do you need to fix your room acoustics first? In other words does your space have room acoustics that match your style. Churches are notorious for not having acoustics that match their style of worship. Whether it’s the well-meaning Organist who thinks every surface in the space must be hard or the Rock n Roll worship leader who thinks the space should be dead as a door nail many times a 3rd party is needed to advise your organization. The truth is that many times a balance can be found between two extremes. Excel AV Group can do everything from basic acoustical treatment recommendations to full on Acoustical studies to solve complex acoustical spaces using software like Ease 4.1 and years of experience. The bottom line is that if your room acoustics are correct for your style it’s much easier for the sound reinforcement system to do its job.

2.Loudspeaker system design – Loudspeakers that are designed and specified for the space with a 3D sound coverage plot. Do the loudspeakers offer sound pattern control if your space is acoustically live? Excel AV Group are authorized dealers for many brands of steerable and pattern control speaker technologies such as Tannoy, Danley Sound Labs, Electrovoice, RCF, Fulcrum Acoustic and others. Excel AV Group will specify the best loudspeaker solution for the space that offers even coverage, great sound that matches the organizations style and fits the budget.

3.Tuning & Processing – Many people do not know that church sanctuary spaces, school auditoriums etc. have acoustical properties that can cause them to spike at specific frequency ranges. Excel AV Group uses Audio processors, Smaart tuning software and years of experience to “tune” or “voice” the sound system for the room. Companies such as Symetrix, Lab Gruppen, BSS SoundWeb and others provide great audio processors that can really make a difference in your space if they are designed and setup right.

4. User interface – A sound system does not have to be complex to run. Excel AV Group sets up “Easy Mix” systems for common every day events such as Weddings, Funerals, daily mass etc. so that inputs are on a very easy to use wireless tablet control or basic interface such as the Symetrix Arc2e. Conversley most of the time we will have a dual function system so that when a sound operator is available all of the inputs can flip to a digital mixer with scene recall ability from companies such as Roland Systems Group, Allen & Heath, Behringer & Midas. Digital mixing consoles are the wave of the future and more affordable than ever.

5. Signal chain – Does your sound system have clean “noise free” mic lines and signal wires? Does it have proper grounding and power sequencing? Excel AV Group works with Furman Sound exclusively for proper power conditioning.

So to summarize Excel AV Group looks at your room acoustics, your style of worship/music and the use in the space, proper loudspeaker system design & selection, tuning & processing, the user interface and the signal chain. If all of the above is designed and installed carefully you will end up with the proper sound system for your space. Contact us today to find out how we can help your organization.