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By JamieRio
I
love the New Year. It’s a chance for us
all to do better than we did during the
last year. This is true for all aspects of
life. However, I am discussing live worship
sound and how you can improve yourself in
that arena this New Year. As for everything
else, there are plenty of TV and radio shrinks
to help you there. So, where do we begin?
200,000 Opportunities FOH
There is no doubt that worship sound
has continued to be a growing and very
lucrative market. There is more room for
growth in this niche of live sound than any
other that I am aware of. Let me give you a
few statistics; right now there are approximately
38,000 Baptist churches, 37,500
Methodist churches and 23,000 Catholic
churches in America. If you add up all the
religious groups that have gathering places
you will find that there are close to 200,000
houses of worship in the U.S. Compare that
to about 15,500 high school auditoriums
and 7,000 Catholic schools. As you can see,
this is not only a big niche, it is the biggest.
There really is no limit to how much sound
can be poured into these houses of worship.
That said, I have been in this biz for a
decade, and I have seen not only a lot of
growth but also a lot of changes in what a
congregation wants from their sound system
and engineers. I know many of you are
volunteering your time as a worship sound
mixer rather than installing sound systems
and working at a variety of worship houses,
so these statistics may not be of that much
interest to you, but you still need to keep up
with what is new and exciting (and many
times better) in the live sound world.
Ahead of the Curve FOH
Let me give you a quick example. Just a
few days ago, I used a matched pair of AKG
C214 microphones on a choir and was really
pleased with the overall improvement
in sound quality that the mics delivered.
Diving Into the Big Niche in 2011
The AKGs were simply better than the mics I
had been using for the last few years in that
particular church. There will always be new
gear to check out (or at least read about),
and staying up on the latest and greatest
should be part of your job description.
Actually, the fact that you are reading
this magazine is a good sign that you already
instinctively know this. I realize that
you may not be able to purchase every
new sound toy that you want in your worship
house. But when the time comes, it
will be easy to choose a new piece of gear
if you have kept up with what is available
out there in the audio world.
Besides keeping up on what is new,
having a good reference book (or two) is
always helpful in your quest to do your job
better. My book, House of Worship Sound
Reinforcement, is one example, and it’s
Visit the church next door (or down the
street) and exercise your God-given
ears. There is no doubt that you will learn
something.
worth checking out, (even if the author is
not above using his column in FOH for a
shameless plug!).
Get Out Much? FOH
Now that you have decided to sharpen
your overall knowledge of sound and
equipment, you may want to dial in on the
needs of your own worship house. How
many of you visit other worship houses to
listen to their sound systems? If you are an
installer, you listen to various systems out
of the necessity of your job. However, you
may simply volunteer and mix at the worship
house of which you are a member and
nowhere else. This is great if you want to
become proficient in the operation of your
house system, but at the same time you
may have separated yourself from the rest
of the sound world. It becomes the goldfish
in a bowl syndrome. You are only aware of
the environment immediately around you.
I suggest you get out and listen to some
other worship sound systems as well as
check other house environments. Visit the
church next door (or down the street) and
exercise your God-given ears. There is no
Bill Gibson, an educator, music pastor and technical director for
a large contemporary music-oriented church in the Seattle area, also
N has taught a 12-week-long Live Sound: Mixing and Recording online
course to 20 students or less at Berklee College of Music. He notes advantages
with online education that include the ability for teachers
to give each student more personalized attention and deal with students progressing at different
rates. But an issue that remains is situational consistency — each of 20 students could potentially
be listening to disparate systems in disparate environments, even though the program material
may be the same. Gibson notes that the online courses still meet a key goal: “to learn the importance
of listening.” …Dana Roun, director of audio programs at Full Sail University, observes that
“actually having the gear and venue is important. Do you say, ‘Imagine you are in a concert hall and
imagine the band is a five-piece metal band and you have a giant FOH rig. Okay, push your laptop
key and pretend you hear the crowd roar?’ I don’t think so.”
—Dan Daley, from “The Biz,” FOH, Dec. 2010
Online Education and Live Sound
www.fohonline.com
doubt that you will learn something. You
may find out that you rock as a worship
house sound mixer. Or you may hear tones
and frequencies that you never knew existed.
Whatever the outcome, you should find
it enlightening. The more worship systems
you can listen to, the more objective you
can become about your own house system.
Besides, all the listening you do will just improve
your ear training and frequency discernment.
I realize that this exercise will take extra
time and effort on your part, but we already
decided we want to do a better job this
year. Right?
H.O.W. Improvement FOH
Back to your own worship house. One
of the most common areas of improvement
in any church is the acoustic environment
of the building itself. This will
involve discovering what materials were
used in the construction of your space
and how those materials react to live
sound and all the frequencies that are
produced. Whatever condition your space
is in, I am sure the acoustics can be im-
Sound Sanctuary
proved. And just like new and innovative
audio gear is always being produced, new
sound treatment materials are regularly
introduced into the sound market. The
understanding and treatment of sound
wave frequencies in any space can be a
very deep study. So, you have your work
cut out for you in investigating your own
house of worship.
I think that in the next few months I
will write something on the latest ideas
on acoustically treating your worship
space. For those of you who work with a
variety of worship houses, you need to
read up on what materials and items are
currently available for sound treatment.
As a matter of fact, the more you know
about sound and controlling it, the better
you will be able to do your job and serve
your clients.
If you make a plan to increase your
personal knowledge this year, you will become
a greater asset to you yourself and
to your house of worship. Good luck!
It’s 2011. Resolve to e-mail Jamie Rio at
jrio@fohonline.com.
2011 JANUARY
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