“There appeared during the sermon to be a sort of echo in the church, which at times rendered the preacher not quite audible."
A challenging building!
John Bull wrote those words after the consecration of Holy Trinity on 12th November, 1827. It seems that the sound has always been something of a challenge! The shape and nature of the building causes us a lot of difficulty. The plain hard surfaces and arched roof space, whilst beautiful to look at, cause a long reverberation time - which can make voices difficult to understand clearly, and drums sound like explosives going off! It also makes the PA more prone to feedback. Luckily Tim Scholes knows his way round the system like the palm of his hand, and heads up a team which knows how to 'work the system'!
Our PA team
In an ideal world you wouldn't know that the sound team existed! Our aim is to help you worship, by making all aspects of the speech and music audible and pleasant to listen to. In practice this is fairly difficult, although we believe that we are now making progress.
There are about a dozen of us, a mix of young people and adults. We try to meet with the music group each week to set the sound levels for the coming service, and to avoid, wherever possible, the screeches and howls that can be so uncomfortable to the congregation. We are presently experimenting with speaker positions, and have discovered that flying them over the dais helps enormously.
Interested?
We are always on the look-out for new volunteers: no experience is necessary, and it isn't as complicated as it looks! Being able to listen is more important than technical knowledge: we can supply whatever training is required. The sound desk is a great way for our young people to get involved in services while learning a really useful skill.
For anyone of a technical disposition...
we have a 24-channel mixing desk, normally set up for 16 music channels, two or three wired microphones on the lectern etc and three radio mics. We are in the process of upgrading the system; presently we have six varied Toa 100v line speakers handling the top to middle frequencies, and a single bass sub. Signal processing is through a single graphic equaliser. We hope to change this in 2006 to six Elecrovoice low-impedance speakers, with full independent signal processing to each speaker, and a new bass sub. For the non technical, that should mean clearer sound, more evenly distributed throughout the building.
We have three channels of foldback to the music group, an independent send to the T-Loop, and the facility to record services. Various other sound sources can be used including CD and PC inputs. The system allows for a visual input too, so we can watch videos and slide presentations through a projector. |
