I get the same emails and letters you get.
“God has ears too, you know!”
“The church is to be an example to the world, not as loud as it!”
“It’s so loud I don’t come anymore.”
“I wish your staff cared about the congregation.”
“You are damaging our ears.”
“Don’t you know about OSHA’s volume limit of 85 dB?”
Any of this sound familiar? Few comments seem to offer anything really helpful, validated with a name and contact information, which service, where they were sitting, and what the author’s “normal” music style preferences are. Otherwise, these are just comments that leave us frustrated. Especially when so many of us are trying so hard to squeeze every drop of excellence out of whatever we have to work with. I have decided, with God’s Grace, to let these comments instead fuel me towards excellence, accuracy, knowledge, experience, and authority in facts, and I hope any words and experiences I can share will do the same for you. My hope is that you may relate, be encouraged, and at least have another opinion to help you more confidently derive at your own.
We all need encouragement with how complicated the topic of volume can be in church. I have been self-immersed in this very topic for not months, but years, and wanted to take the risk of sharing where I am on a journey to answer the question, “How loud should it be in my church?”
Opening
Almost four years ago, Willow Creek Community Church opened the doors to our new facility. And we went online with awesome overall improvement in sound. Indeed, there was an adrenaline rush amidst the exhaustion of getting to that point. Over the months that followed, we were getting reports that were all over the map. From “best sound ever” to “way too loud” and “can’t understand the vocals.” We knew it was way better, but we had only begun the long process of experiencing all 7,200 seats and what actually happens there during a service. Because of the range of reports coming in, hard decisions had to be made. We knew that many factors beyond volume were playing into the range of reports. We needed a common denominator as a guideline to make things safe and normal for most seats, while hopefully not making things too wimpy and gutless, so we could really assess the state of the system and learn how to use it.
The Quiet Ceiling
The decision was made to run services at 95 dB peak SPL C-weighting fast-response as measured on several sound pressure level (SPL) meters at the FOH position. Man, if I could poll your responses right now. That survey would be worth publishing in itself. More important than the number, or its qualifiers, is the fact that we made this decision in cooperation with leadership, and with their full trust and support. This number gave us an anchor of consistency and a mutual response to all those concerned. It has been a great learning experience. It has also been one of the hardest decisions to stick to I have ever had to lead. To mix to a peak means to take energy from mixing and pay attention to a jumping meter constantly, because peaks are fast, so you have to anticipate them. When I know to the core of my being that a song in a service would come alive and communicate better with a bit more level, but also know that we have committed to a peak, it has at times been truly agonizing. It sometimes felt like throwing art out the window. Not that I’m fighting for it to be louder. But I know as a skilled engineer, passionate artist/musician, and sensitive congregation member, how good audio can best support the band, and how the band needs to be represented. That was just plain hard. But it was also the right thing to do.
My staff has also expressed the same tensions. I felt like the bad guy so many times, re-stating that we will not deviate from our decision until all 19 remaining system-wide tests and projects (we had identified) have been completed, even though I knew at times it was tearing the artist in them apart. But it has kept the trust, and that’s worth more than the personal “high” of a perfect level, or the optimum supporting level possible (for a season). We were going for long-term gain with minimal negative impact. We were building trust while optimizing the system.
Team
It’s very difficult for one person to come up with how loud things should be. That’s because when you come right down to it, it’s really a feeling that you are trying to recreate. An engaging sense of support for the program, which at times is comfortable, and by design, sometimes uncomfortable. And because everyone has a different level of comfort and a different engagement level, and because content and environment are a constant variable, it works best if a “target” experience is arrived at by input from more than one person. Collaboration is the key here. That means coffee. Coffee with your service director, worship leader, producer, and anyone who is involved in creating the worship experience. You’ll need to develop a common language and become good at interpreting the words that less technical folks use. It’s important to educate others about better ways to communicate their ideas about sound levels, as well as for us engineers to learn “normal speak.” Saying “dB” in a sentence doesn’t solve anything, unless frustration is the goal. They will also need to understand that a number on an SPL meter can mean different things depending on content. For instance, if music is midrange heavy it may cause a reaction of being way too loud compared to a low-end heavy section of music that actually reads higher on an SPL meter in C-weighting. Also, the beginning of a musical piece will probably be received as too loud if it starts off at the same level as you’d typically find at the end of a long gradual climb in level.
It’s important to leave room for dynamics and to allow adequate time for the congregation to adjust to higher levels, if that’s where you are headed for maximum effectiveness. Don’t use up all your headroom on the downbeat. If your room is half full, it will probably need to be quieter. But not so quiet as to weaken the intended impact of the program. It truly is a delicate balance. I trust my leaders. They don’t have to worry about the 100 subtle sub-cues and anticipations of sound in every song. And I don’t have to worry about the rest of the production universe outside of audio when I’m mixing, which is only one piece of a very big picture.
Volume Affects Response
Volume affects the congregation’s emotional response; 6 dB can literally raise a room to their feet or cause an awkward lack in participation. For now, we’re not talking about personal style preferences. Personal preference could say a guitar “looks” too loud, but a pipe organ and a choir at 105 dB are righteous. Taking out personal preference leaves what? Many things, including: The maturity of the congregation, the heart and effectiveness of the leader, the sensitivity and musicality of the band to follow, the maturity and musicality of the engineer, and anticipation. And more physically and mechanically, the acoustics of the room, the noise floor, the quality of the PA, the dynamic responsiveness of the mix engineer, among many other things.
Many factors affect the environment, and the environment can either support or detract from a worship experience. It is a phenomenon created by the pure number of people gathering in one place, and the culture determining what affective communication is, as well as their openness to God. If I have two people come to my living room with an acoustic guitar, we can certainly worship with no equipment. If we are at a team retreat with 50 people, we might need a speaker-on-a-stick for the leader and a keyboard. If we are in a gym with 800, we might need a PA for the band. And in an arena, we need even more because the awesome sound of thousands of worshipping voices is loud, and that requires sound reinforcement levels to enable the worship team to be heard.
Some 7,200 voices in our awesome acoustic space instantly buried our 95 dB peak cap. Awesome indeed, but also very challenging. Pushing the leader on top of the room meant getting uncomfortably loud for unknown seats, so we had to under-support the stage for the greater good. At least until the system was leveled out so the FOH mix position had a good representation of the louder parts of the room (one of our 19 identified goals of tweaking the system). The level in the PA for sound reinforcement needs to be proportional to the level of the congregation singing. Keeping congregational participation as a present element of the overall mix hasbecome a personal priority.
Non-Worship
What about when the congregation is not singing? Then the volume needs to be proportional to the amount of energy being visually expressed from the stage. If it’s a video roll, then consideration needs to be given to what effectively supports it. Most of us have been to the previews at movie theaters. If you had an SPL meter in there, you might be surprised at the levels that move you emotionally. Less than that could be considered wimpy or gutless, or emotionally perceived as less bold, confident, or credible. Proportional means in the louder parts as well as in the quiet ones.
Sometimes the most effective level for an element or a transition is actually silence, which becomes redefined as the noise floor of your facility. For Willow, that means the sum of the moving light fans and the LED screen fans. We even kill some of these cooling systems at certain times (with careful monitoring) so the bottom of the dynamic range of a service can be more effective. If thousands can hear a pin drop, the stage might be set for a defining moment in someone’s life. Just like what can happen with a rockin’ song where the power of music can prepare a different person for that same kind of moment.
Proportional to Stage
Volume also needs to be proportional to the stage noise levels to be effective. Our stage is quiet, with all monitors typically being in-ear monitors (IEMs). Our loudest stage-level sources are guitar speakers and an organ’s Leslie mic’d backstage, as well as the drum kit. Even still, for localization to not be thrown out the window, and to avoid arrival timing confusion, I have observed that the PA covering seats closer to the stage needs to be at least 5 dB hotter than the acoustic arrivals from the stage. This number is more complicated than pure masking, as it includes acoustic reflections off the stage floor, front fills blending with the PA, and a different psychological experience when you are a few feet from the live action.
When you are further back, well into the “meat” of the PA, image magnification (IMAG) screens become part of the overall experience, also impacting how volume “feels.”
In part two, we’ll discuss the SPL meter levels and settings, SPLeq, logging requirements, and how loud should it be.
Chris Gille is also known as “Papa Audio,” or audio & systems director in the production department of Willow Creek Community Church.
