As is common at many churches these days, the worship services at La Crescenta Presbyterian Church have, in recent years, evolved into a combination of traditional and contemporary programs in an effort to be relevant to all age groups.
Part of this evolution involves the transition from traditional piano/organ and choir-based music services to those that incorporate a vocal group with the support of an instrumental ensemble, or praise band.
With these changes, the necessity of having a sound reinforcement system capable of providing both a high degree of speech intelligibility and solid music reproduction became increasingly important.
To address this vital concern, the church recently upgraded its loudspeaker setup and installed a new TrueLine line array system from WorxAudio Technologies.
Church member Dan Blessinger, President of dB Mix, Inc., is a music producer for video games, TV, film, and records.
Recognizing the shortcomings of the church’s prior sound system, he served as one of two consultants on the upgrade project and partnered with Kevin Hughes of Design Technik, an audio, video, and lighting design consultancy, in an effort to rectify the situation.
After reviewing their options, they ultimately selected a 7-element WorxAudio TrueLine X1i installation line array system.
“Music is a significant part of our services,” explained Blessinger. “The prior sound system always suffered from spotty coverage, ineffective music reproduction, and less than ideal speech intelligibility.”
“These issues became even more pronounced when we started with the more contemporary worship programs. Previously, we had two loudspeakers at the front of the sanctuary and these simply weren’t adequate for the size of the room, which is roughly 125 feet in length, 60 feet wide, with seating capacity for 200-300 people.”
“Recognizing the advantages of line array technology, Kevin [Hughes] designed the system and I oversaw its installation. The new system is centrally positioned over the stage / altar area—flown at a height of roughly 35 feet.”
The WorxAudio TrueLIne X1i installation line array is a two-way, high efficiency, line array loudspeaker that incorporates a medium format, 1-inch exit compression driver with dual 8-inch cone transducers into an ultra compact high performance enclosure that is ideal for the reproduction of speech and music program material.
La Crescenta Presbyterian Church’s 7-element system and the proprietary subwoofers are powered by Lab Gruppen fp 2200 amplifiers. The line array system’s integrated, custom designed flyware enables the user to easily array the system to the precise desired coverage area—and this was one of the key system attributes that impressed Blessinger the most.
“I was very impressed with the flyware,” Blessinger said. “The ability to make fine adjustments to the system is quite impressive and, being that the individual enclosures are very directional, a small change in the pin settings can dramatically impact the coverage. Kevin specified all the pin positions and his settings worked out incredibly well.”
Blessinger installed La Crescenta Presbyterian Church’s new sound reinforcement system during the early part of May and it was placed into service later that month. In the six months since, it has been very well received. “Everyone is very complimentary of the system,” Blessinger said.
“We now have uniform coverage throughout the space and the loudspeakers don’t disturb the line of sight to the front of the hall. Given the surprisingly compact nature of this system, speech intelligibility is excellent and its music reproduction capabilities are very impressive.”
“The system’s coverage is solid all the way to the back row and the balcony of the sanctuary.”
“I couldn’t be happier with the system,” he said, “and I feel as though Kevin Hughes did a fantastic job of specifying the system with the right number of enclosures for the room.”
“As a mix engineer who typically works in a very controlled environment, I was very impressed with the sound quality and coverage of this system. So much so that, upon first hearing it, the system brought a big smile to my face.”
