New or old pa, acoustics in your church?

[broadcaster]

Does your church have a decent system or still struggling with ancient, out dated equipment?

Ours is still running stuff from the 80's from the old building with blown speakers, raw-no processors and one noisy power amp for the front and monitors. it is hard to hear oneself play with the poor, limited mix in the monitors. Whenever updating is brought up, excuses are made to go with what we have "because it sounds good" - to the laymen in the pews whom have no idea how much better things could be, exception the singers and musicians struggling to hear ourselves. The sound is bouncing off the block walls on the side and back of the sanctuary which makes for a muddified mess. Updating has never been a priority for anyone except the music director and musicians.

Personally, I am embarrassed when a outside performer comes in as guest music. Most all bring there own system instead of using the house system.

Bring the issue up to a deacon and they will tell you there is no money for this and will joke with you that you yourself feel free to pay for a new system, than change the subject. This nice church has no mortgage, and spends ALOT of money on many other missions and a huge annual outdoor festival.

I don't get it.

[jbmando]

Our stuff is a few years old but the acoustics in our sanctuary are hideous. We do as good a job as we can with the conditions, and most of our sounds techs do a decent job. I play bass 75% of the time, acoustic guitar 20% and electric guitar 5%, and we don't use amps at all. The feeling is that we will give up that last little bit of tone for the greater good, and it simply works better for us to have low stage volume with monitors and let the congregation hear the whole mix from the mains rather than having it so loud in the front that you can't hear the singers. Our organ can be painfully loud, and as we have recently reverted to one service in an attempt to more closely unite the body, we use the organ in every service for almost every song so it tends to overpower the band.

I'd say, in the scheme of things, the missions budget has a greater priority than the music budget, but it is important to have equipment and musicians who "play skillfully" and old or inadequate sound systems can really detract from an otherwise worshipful experience. Financial officers of churches should not kid themselves - the laymen in the audience know if the sound is poor quality. They may not know how to put it, or what they don't like about it, but they know it.

[jb12string]

Our church is an acoustic disaster and we have the documentation to prove it. Our system is comprised mostly of old Altec horns with amps that are probably almost 20 years old, all in all, the system isn't terrible, I'd love to hear it with the acoustics treated. I know a guy who says you can't fix an acoustic problem with an electronic solution. If anyone is interested, I can give you the name of the group of guys that did our conuslt, the gave us a great report with specific steps to treat our problems, now if we can come up with cash to implement them...
BTW, if you think you have it bad with your missions budget, try having a fairly large mission headquartered 5 miles away from your church, and most of the "execs" attend your church. I appreciate their passion, but if you listen to them long enough, you'd almost think that we should be focusing more on the rest of the world than our own neigborhood, or if we have to deal with our neighbors, we should at least focus on the internationals. I am not saying its a bad thing, I just believe that God cares about everyone's soul equally [/rant]

[Saxguitar]

It sounds like we are in a very similar situation, everyone who does music agrees we need a better system and some more skilled hands to run it. The trustees at our church have wanted a new speaker for years so our sound board can be used to its full potential, as the musical director says. Everytime we get the money to get the new equipment the boiler blows or something happens and they have to start at square one again. Our sound is off the wall most the time and anymore all I can hear is drums and a little piano, no bass no guitar. I just sit there and smile while I strum a seemingly dead guitar, however recently my guitar has been getting turned up and I am beginning to hear myself more. They moved a monitor down by where I sit to play so I could hear the whole group a little better. Out of date our equipment sure is and probably will be until the main finally gives out. The music director told me that one Sunday I should just start playing something like the Pink Panther just to see how the sound team responds and to add a twist to the set. Haven't got the guts to do it yet but it might be coming soon.

[broadcaster]

Bar bands and clubs have great systems and are packed with folks, in contrast to many churches which have lame equipment that "sounds good" to the folks in charge.

[3Ply]

I know this is a touchy subject and frustrating for the worship team in particular. To me, music and worship in particular is a core value, so we do the best we can with a limited budget to present as well as possible. I have allocated funds to upgrade our system a little at a time... kind of like getting a new toy every month or so. To be honest, you must have a pastor who has a heart for worship and quality sound or it won't happen for the most part.

In our situation, I'm one of three lead guitarists and the senior pastor so I can allocate funds as needed or as they come in. Being a smaller church of only 300, it is a challenge and we seem to live in the tension of upgrading and available funds. I do feel for you guys (and gals :-)) who know the difference between good and terrible sound. Rock on for the King!

[broadcaster]

Originally Posted by 3Ply

To be honest, you must have a pastor who has a heart for worship and quality sound or it won't happen for the most part.

There you have it.