Church Sound Article Tue, December 02, 2008

Pastored by Casey and Wendy Treat for 28 years, Christian Faith Center has one of the largest and fastest-growing congregations in the United States. The church is located on two main campuses in suburban Seattle—one of which is a state-of-the-art facility completed in September 2007—and 8,000 people a week now attend services at the two sites. Christian Faith Center is dedicated to continuous growth, and has integrated the highest quality equipment at their facilities to ensure a worship experience second to none. When it came to upping the ante with regard to sound reinforcement, the church worked with AV specialists Michael Garrison Associates to install two XL8 systems in the 5000-seat sanctuary at their new campus, a 550-sq. ft. octagonal space with stadium seating. Kris Hillstrom, Technical Director at Christian Faith Center, described how the church is sounding better than ever with the inimitable warm sound—and unprecedented digital flexibility—of Midas XL8 consoles at both FOH and monitor mix positions:

“We knew that we wanted to make a substantial investment in our new sound system. Seattle is a very music-savvy part of the world, and we and felt that, as one of the largest houses of worship in the Northwest, we had high standards to uphold. We want to provide an inspiring, high fidelity experience for the congregation, and Midas, with its industry standard reputation, was the way to achieve that. We’ve been preparing our congregation for this building for seven years, and expectations were very high; the XL8 has surpassed them all.

“Our praise and music teams perform in a wide range of musical styles,” Hillstrom adds, “from gospel to upbeat contemporary rock, all of it high energy. The overall atmosphere is fresh and energetic; services can be very dynamic, with frequent changeovers. A high performance sound system is an essential element of how we worship, and we wanted the new facility to be equipped as a state of the art performance venue. We bring in a lot of big-name Christian groups, and up to this point we’ve had to hire huge PAs to meet their riders; that was not only expensive, it was a lot of work for our technical team. The XL8s have changed everything: the flexibility of having a 96-input console installed at both FOH and Monitors is a very big deal, and, of course, every visiting engineer is happy to see the Midas badge and excited to mix on the new digital Midas!