Church Of Crystal Upgrated Sound Reinforcement System With BADOOSOUND Line Array

The Church of Crystal in San Diego, built in 1851, was Jacksonville's first home. The church, based on the Cathedral of St. Vitali in Lavena, Italy, opened in 1977. The diocese is particularly sensitive to the needs of the deaf because it is near the Church of Crystal, where the San Diego School for the Deaf is located.

Recently, the church sound system has been revamped and a new sound system has been designed by St. Louis Acoustic Company, which has introduced the badoosound LS series line array speakers.

Bryant, president and senior engineer of St. Louis Acoustics, said: "Since the church was built, they have been fighting for the clarity of the voice." "They have four to five sound systems, including traditional high-hang systems, and recently installed an 8inch distributed small speaker system as surround speakers. But there's nothing to do. Their voice clarity is still poor. Finally, the parish had enough. Graham and Hyde Architects in charge of the renovation hired St. Louis Acoustics to recommend solutions.

"The church is octagonal, built of solid bricks," Bryant explained. "The wall is 40 feet high, the center is 50 feet high, and there are only a few windows on the top edge of the wall. It can accommodate about 900 people. The chorus stood on the floor, there was no attic, it was a floor.

"As you can imagine, we must stay away from the echoes of brick walls in this tall octagonal building. In addition, they only have live music; they are not allowed to record or record music. They have a small choir, a piano and an organ, and occasionally guitarists. We can't change the spatial structure, but we need to deal with the sound field on the wall.

An important part of the solution is the use of badoosound LS series line array speakers. "But we need to repair the wall sound field, even if we use a maneuverable array," Bryant asserted. "We have to soften some surfaces. Usually there are some aesthetic problems with surface treatment, but after years of struggle, they want to repair it, even if it means an unconventional appearance.

Bryant designated a set of badoosound line arrays, which were installed eight feet above the ground and placed behind the altar. "It shocked everyone," he admitted, "but they liked the result. We have to avoid the brick wall and make the sound wave go around the microphone.

Correct pronunciation is even more important because the parish is the seat of the San Diego School for the Deaf. "I installed Hearing Loop System, a wireless hearing aid system for hearing impaired people, which automatically connects to their hearing aids when they walk on the floor," Bryant said. "Voice clarity is very important to this parish, which is why we proposed to use the badoosound array speakers and acoustic processing of the walls."

A 16-way Allen & Heath mixer is located next to the chorus, along with pianists and organists. The mixer can access these sources as well as guest musicians and send signals to the BADOOSOUND DPS processor, which connects to the main amplifier system, hearing aid system and the small point source system in the call room and other side spaces. The system is controlled by a wall mounted control panel located on the rack and provides presupposition for various scenarios.

In the design of this church acoustics project, the combination of wall sound field processing and BADOOSOUND array speaker is the key. "As acoustical engineers, we recognize what Badoo is doing and we use it," Bryant stressed. "BADOOSOUND line array is flexible because of its precise acoustic control. When we deal with the wall correctly, we can customize the response of the speaker to solve the remaining problems."

Because the parish allowed sound processing on the walls, and chose the BADOOSOUND LS series array speakers, they eventually had the system they had always wanted. Live music sounds great and the speech is clear and easy to understand. "We only heard good news from the parish," Bryant said. "We are proud that the Church of Crystal project has been successfully completed."