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LCR Line Arrays For Dynamic Worship
The Prayer Palace Upgrades To Concert-Level System
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The Prayer Palace, located in Toronto, Ontario, and one of the largest
houses of worship in North America, recently received an audio facelift
with a new left-center-right concert-level system in its worship sanctuary.
The octagonal-shaped sanctuary, with seating for more than 4,500, hosts
two regularly scheduled and Sunday masses and a variety of other secular
and ethnic events. The new system project focused on upgrading main
loudspeaker selection and placement, an issue that had proven problematic
over the past couple of years.
Sound Plus Show Systems of Concord, Ontario, provided the design, installation
and equipment for the retrofit, working closely with Prayer Palace Pastor
Tom Melnichuk and church technical staff. The relationship between the
two entities began two years ago with the rental of the odd piece of
equipment, and eventually grew to the point where the church asked Sound
Plus to consult on the majority of its production work.
“The existing system was beautifully installed,” explains
Chris Mathany, technical director of Sound Plus. “The problem
seemed to be with poor design, with many clusters of traditional trapezoidal
cabinets. The addition of clusters was only serving to muddy the direct
sound in certain areas and creating hot spots in others. My assessment
was that dropping and re-hanging the entire system would be less expensive
- but far less effective - than bringing in a line array system that
would actually fix the problem.”
The previous loudspeakers “were not projecting with clarity, in
spite of many relocations and additional equalization,” echoes
Melnichuk. “Therefore, the ‘message’ - spoken word
and music alike - became a transmission of incoherency. To me, it seemed
almost impossible to get sound anywhere near acceptable.”
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Sound Plus priced upgrade options and presented them to the church
tech team. The primaray option was replacing the existing clusters with
a front left-right configuration of Adamson
Y-Axis Y-10 small-format line arrays, supported by a small center line
array made up of recently introduced Adamson SpekTrix line arrays. Both
loudspeaker models are three-way designs.
Melnichuk initially expressed a bit of skepticism, with the design called
for just 20 compact loudpseaker elements divided among the three arrays.“
I said it wasn’t possible,” he notes. “We had a much
larger number of speakers, and from a well-known, high-end brand, installed
in several clusters throughout the sanctuary.”
However, a full demo system brought in to change minds met its intended
purpose. Help in determining array composition, placement and angles
was supplied by Adamson Shooter software, a predictive program.
Jesse Adamson, managing director of the loudspeaker company, provided
his input regarding use of Shooter during this phase of the project.
“I did two separate phases,” he explains. “First,
we looked at coverage with the main arrays at the far left and right
of the stage. Next, due to what Shooter was predicting with regard to
coverage, we added the center cluster to bolster front/center coverage.
Then we were able to see that we could raise the center array up a few
more meters in relation to left and right without impacting its coverage.”
The main left-right arrays are each comprised of eight Y-10 elements,
spaced roughly 150 feet apart, and tilted slightly inward to account
for the room’s octagonal shape. Due to the large distance between
the main arrays, necessary in part to maintain clear line of sight with
the front platform, the four SpekTrix cabinets are arrayed “dead
center” and tilted downward at an extreme angle, where they cover
the slight “hole” in the front/center of the audience area.
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Left and right arrays are fed from the L/R mains on the Soundcraft
K2 house console at the mix position, while the center array is delivered
an L/R sum sent via a matrix output on the console.
The mains, running in stereo, are controlled by an XTA
DP226 (2 input, 6 output) processor, while the center array is fed by
an XTA DP224 (mono input, 4 output) processor. All power is supplied
QSC amplifiers,
mostly retained from the previous system, with eight QSC PowerLight
4.0 units added to drive the low-frequency section of the Y-10 loudspeakers.
Mathany adds that both Sound Plus as well as the church technical team
and congregation have expressed satisfaction with the results of the
project, adding that plans call for Adamson Y-10 subwoofers - to replace
the existing subs - be phased in later this year.
“People that continually complained about our former system are
now congratulating us,” concludes Melnichuk.
