Reprinted from the March 2007 issue of Church Production Magazine

Jubilee Fellowship Church

Compact arrays' clarity and intelligibility delivers audio excellence to Colorado-based church

For Lone Tree, Colorado-based Jubilee Fellowship Church (JFC), founded in 1998, audio and acoustical excellence were primary in swaying installation decisions for their new 700-seat, 6,370 square-foot “club-sized” venue. With two acoustic guitars, bass, electric lead guitar, two keyboards, violin, drums, four to six back-up singers, and an ensemble of 10 to 15 additional singers (mic’ed as groups), the church features what most people would refer to as leading-edge contemporary praise and worship music.

Originally housed in a school, Jubilee Fellowship’s growing congregation moved to a storefront location. Then in 2003, the church was presented with the opportunity to purchase five acres in one of the fastest growing counties in the nation.

Initial Installation

During initial facility planning, the areas of audio, lighting, and video were not readily addressed. Jeff Johnson, a member of the church’s board of directors at that time, stressed to fellow board members the fundamental necessity of presenting the spoken word with clarity. It was envisioned aloud to the board a church experience that would capture the nuances of their praise and worship team—all without inducing ear fatigue. These concepts resonated with JFC’s Senior Pastor, John Leach, who directed Johnson to assemble and chair a task force to help further define the project’s parameters.

A problematic issue that quickly became apparent was the sanctuary’s configuration. The room’s rectangular shape was designed with the stage set slightly off center along one of the longer walls. In addition to the challenge of a shallow but wide throw area was the somewhat challenging stair-stepped or “faceted” acoustical tile ceiling. The build up of frequencies, especially the bass frequencies, was a concern as the ceiling height sloped downward from 20 feet over stage center to 11 feet at the back of the room. As such, a traditional left and right sound system was out of the question.

“We knew pretty quickly that a line array would be critical to the success of sound for the room. At the time we weren’t sure what kind of line array would work—some of the traditional line arrays were monstrously big for us,” recalls Johnson.

The JFC Task Force crafted a comprehensive RFQ (request for quote) and, ultimately, Audio Analysts, located in Colorado Springs, Colorado, was selected as the turnkey contractor. The Task Force based their decision on a number of criteria. Audio Analysts demonstrated a consistent grasp of JFC’s goals from the beginning and continued to provide them with a solid design and alternative approaches for consideration. Audio Analysts Vice President of Worship and the Audio Systems Designer for JFC, Robert Langois, selected two compact self-powered main arrays consisting of six Meyer M1D curvilinear loudspeakers for stage right and left. The mains are supplemented by an additional array of two M1D cabinets to provide sidefill at stage right, where there is longer distance from the stage to the room’s side wall. Embedded into the step area below each main array is a Meyer USW-1P compact subwoofer.

Audio Analysts’ Senior Audio Engineer, Joe Caruso Jr., served as the installer for Jubliee’s new system, and he notes, “With this particular sanctuary you have to be more controlled so you’re not reflecting off the ceiling at all. The Meyer M1D’s are highly controllable. That allowed us to shape them to project right along Jubilee’s stepped ceiling line.”

Aside from the functionality of control, the Meyer speakers offered other solutions to the project. Johnson notes, “Key factors from a physical aspect were the Meyer Sound clusters of six M1Ds [that have] 30% less vertical footprint than other traditional speaker clusters.” With the reduced vertical footprint, sightlines were not impeded for the church’s two retractable nine- by 12-foot Da-Lite Tensioned Cosmopolitan Electrol screens (eventually replaced by three smaller 7x9 Da-Lite Cosmopolitan Electrol screens). The M1D’s substantially smaller horizontal footprint also helped maintain the overall visual aesthetics of the stage area. The Task Force found that the compact M1D’s lighter weight helped with issues of load factors with the roof support structure, as well as with tensile strength (needed for supporting the I-beam) when positioning the speakers. Further, the M1D, a self-powered speaker, saved dollars and space, eliminating a series of amplifiers needed for a conventional speaker arrangement.

The front-of-house (FOH), featuring a custom-made twelve by six foot production booth, is located just off center house about fifty feet back. A Midas Verona analog 480/8/IP was chosen as the main mixing console due to the quality of sound, array of features and functionality for the price.

The customized production booth was designed with portability in mind. To make the best use of available floor space, quick connects were installed so the entire booth can be easily disconnected and moved. That portability was taken a step further by adding the ability to run all or some of the equipment from side of the stage. “An offshoot of the portability is that if we bring in a touring group they can then use our booth for monitor mixes from stage side and plug their own equipment into our quick connects at the back of the sanctuary,” notes Johnson.

Housed in a room stage left is an Aviom 16-channel personal monitoring system.“Switching to an Aviom in-ear system instead of floor monitors has allowed us to keep stage volume down while giving the musicians full ability to customize their own monitor mix. No longer do we have to bump the house volume to drown out the stage monitors. A big problem now fixed,” says Tom Cain, JFC’s audio director.

Jubilee’s new facility has seen a tremendous growth in church attendance in a relatively short time. Eighteen months after their first services, the church is serving more than 2,200 weekend attendees and has added a fifth service to their weekend line-up. While higher than anticipated attendance has been embraced, logistical implications have meant additional seating installation in the sanctuary. As a result, adding an additional speaker, adjusting the J-curve and re-tuning the room is needed to provide adequate coverage for the now “dead” front four rows of seats.

In hindsight of their initial audio installation, JFC’s Media Pastor, Marcus Piller, urges churches to consider the consequences of growth in ministry activity within the church. “Looking back, we would have opted for a digital console from the start. The Midas has lived up to our expectations, however, with the sanctuary’s increasing number of ministry functions, a digital soundboard has become almost a necessity. Tom Cain, head of our sound department, has done a wonderful job maximizing this system to meet our current needs,” says Piller. Still, hours are required to change EQ levels between ministry events. To better accommodate their active ministry, Piller says JFC is currently looking to purchase a Yamaha PM5D digital console.”

Lighting on a Budget

The original vision for lighting was to create as even a theatrical stage wash as possible within a limited budget. The Task Force selected Denver, Colorado’s Barbizon Light of the Rockies as the lighting turnkey provider. Barbizon Light recommended eight Procan PAR64 cans and 12 ETC Source Four Jr. Ellipsoidals. “We went with Ellipsoidals, initially, so we could tailor the footprint of the beam,” says Johnson, who points out that JFC’s emphasis on infrastructure was to be able to grow the lighting system. “We did put hooks in as far as power, in terms of lighting and hanging hardware, to support lights for future growth. We also purchased two ETC Unison DR 12-24-120 dimmer panels that offer system expansion so that ETC D20 dimmer modules can be added when necessary.” Lights are controlled from an ETC SmartFade 24/96 Console.

Video: From Basic to Broadcast

A vision for video morphed from side screen projection to the necessity for a complete broadcast production suite. Driving that vision has been the explosive growth experienced at JFC since opening their new facility “What Pastor John has decided to do,” says Ted Cumpston, president of Audio Visual Resource Group of Denver, Colorado, “is to plant video church campuses—each with their own sheparding pastor and worship teams.” Campus’ services, however, will feature DVD playback burned with Pastor Leach’s weekend message.

Cumpston, who served as JFC’s volunteer project coordinator and designer of the video installation, benefited from purchasing used equipment when constructing their suite. “We were able to add a complete production room for less than $100,000,” he notes. And Cumpston adds, “We’ve added three Sony D30 video cameras and a DFS700 Sony switcher. Probably the biggest reason we chose the Sony D30s is they put out a great picture and, when taken care of, will last a very long time. Even though they are a discontinued item, if we do a special event it’s much easier to find Sony products to add in than some other manufacturers. With the Sony DFS700 it’s a simple switcher to operate, yet it has very powerful capabilities. You don’t have to be an engineer to set up your sources to go into it and it allows us to go component, composite, or FDI.”

The production room is housed in what used to be a “very nice-sized cry room” with a viewing window into the sanctuary. There are Focus Enhancement Fire Store FS2Es for capturing everything. “Even with analog, what we record with [a] camera ends up digital on deck.” Apple Final Cut Pro is used as the editing platform of choice when finishing the message to burn onto DVD. The new production suite will assist in taking Jubilee Fellowship Church the next step as they embark, adding many new campus churches. As Piller states, “We are here to help spread the gospel of Christ through audio/visual excellence. Our equipment gives us the ability, and our volunteers make it all happen.”

Alison Istnick is a regular contributing writer for Church Production Magazine and Worship Facilities Magazine. She can be reached at aistnick@churchproduction.com.