It was a couple of years ago, during the COVID pandemic. Your church had quickly pivoted to online-only services for a few months (after having never done any streaming before!), and since no one was in the room live, you just took the main output from your console to send to the broadcast feed. But when some people started coming back, while others remained at home, your pastor decided your church needed to do hybrid services, available live in person and online simultaneously.
But how?! With monitors, subs, and the CD recording decks taking all of the AUX outputs, there wasn’t anything left to send online for a decent mix!
Or maybe it was last Fall. Your pastor’s mechanic’s cousin now fronts an up-and-coming Christian bluegrass band, and they agreed to do a concert at your facility as a fundraiser for your ministry. A flat tire on the tour bus prevented them from making it in time to rehearse, so with everyone in a huff, they show up just before having to take the stage.
The quartet insists on each having their own personal monitor mix and the frontman adamantly campaigns for separate mics for his harmonica, his washboard, and his jug. You meekly let him know that your Reagan-era Peavey console won’t support that amount of I/O, only for him to stomp back to the bus, and refuse to do the show.
Or perhaps it was back at Easter. Everything had gone great for rehearsals, but you unfortunately couldn’t be there for the Good Friday service. You had dialed in everything ahead of time and had asked the third-string bass player to fill in for you and just babysit the faders.
Unfortunately, during the quick pre-service sound check, his four-year-old found the console and was amused by all of the colored knobs. Three quick minutes later, every single one of them had been dialed to “straight up” with the proud toddler beaming at how effectively he made all of the dials match perfectly. The service was a borderline trainwreck and you and the band spent the entire next day having to run through everything again in an attempt to get things back in a functional place.
Or maybe it was something completely different from any of these.
But chances are, there was one moment when you had the thought burn through your consciousness: "I have GOT to get a new audio console."
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Reuben Poon, Director of Production Systems, Awaken Church, San Diego, Calif.
For Reuben Poon, it wasn’t just one trigger, but several.
“We had numerous issues,” says the Director of Production Systems at Awaken Church, a multi-site church based in San Diego. “The software would sometimes ‘freeze’ and be unresponsive. For the monitor desk, the console would stop passing audio and/or not allow us to make any changes until we restarted the console. We had some gain pot problems where the input channel gain would change up and down randomly without anyone touching the console. You could see the gain on the screen move up and down. There were times when changes would not save and the console would revert to an earlier saved scene,” Poon continues.
“The issues got so bad that in the middle of a one-month tech rehearsal for our large Broadway-level theater shows, we purchased a brand-new system and completely switched from one ecosystem to another for audio,” he recalls.
…high-level troubleshooting is easier with standardized equipment instead of needing to know different setups across multiple locations.”
—Reuben Poon, Director of Production Systems, Awaken Church, San Diego, Calif.
Modern digital audio consoles are typically seen as a capital-level investment capable of lasting a church at least 7-10 years if properly maintained (some analog consoles may still be functioning 20-30 years post-install!). Some may last longer.
But beyond just technology failure, there might be other reasons why it’s time to move on to new hardware.
The church’s vision has changed, resulting in new requirements for I/O. The church is expanding to multi-site, requiring a solution that is replicable and scalable across multiple locations. Or, maybe a recent embrace of a volunteer-heavy workflow leads to a desire for a desk that’s more intuitive and easier to use.
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Jason Duncan, Experiences Pastor, Mount Paran North, Atlanta.
At Mount Paran North, a congregation just north of Atlanta, it was a confluence of several factors that led to a massive sanctuary redesign and audio system overhaul a few years ago.
“Our previous console fought us at every turn,” recalls Jason Duncan, who has been at the church in a variety of roles since 2010. “Our room and systems were designed originally as a TV recording studio with a focus on preaching, choir and orchestra. After making the decision to move in a more contemporary direction, we quickly found that our technical and stylistic choices would require different equipment. It is astounding how difficult it is to accomplish vision without the proper tools,” he adds.
“Nothing will frustrate you or your volunteers more than using tools that are difficult or impossible to use.”
—Jason Duncan, Experiences Pastor, Mount Paran North, Atlanta
The project was completed in late 2019, just after Duncan moved into a role as the Experiences Pastor, which involves overseeing all aspects of weekend services. So beyond just taking a technology-focused view of the project, he knew the importance of a holistic approach to the install and how critical it would be to consider usability, not just quality.
“We contract our FOH engineer for large gatherings, but wanted a system that our music and media staff could run for smaller events,” he points out.
“Nothing will frustrate you or your volunteers more than using tools that are difficult or impossible to use,” he cautions. “Everyone, no matter their experience or training, wants to meet expectations. It’s our job as leaders to provide our volunteers with the tools to succeed. Bells and whistles are great, but at the end of the day, if you can’t figure out how to meet expectations and function in a competent way, you are doomed to a life of frustration.”
It's this same focus on usability that has driven several decisions for Awaken Church’s Poon in his audio console purchases.
“None of our Sunday service production team are paid staff or contractors. Some of our audio volunteers are brand-new to anything production-related, so having a system that is as easy to use and learn as possible is great for them,” Poon notes.
Across Awaken’s eight campuses, consoles are either in the Midas or Allen & Heath family, with the FOH and monitor consoles being identical at each location. With so many campuses and with such a high reliance on volunteers, and with a limited support staff, it is a level of consistency that has been critical to maintain.
“With supply chain issues, having the same brand makes it very easy to shift equipment around for new needs or when equipment gets broken or needs to be repaired. We are also able to move some volunteers around campuses to fill gaps for serving. Plus, high-level troubleshooting is easier with standardized equipment instead of needing to know different setups across multiple locations,” he explains.
Scalability and ease of use shouldn’t go overlooked when considering a console purchase. But at its core, the console has to function at a level of quality and reliability that a ministry expects.
Lower-cost consoles might be more cost-efficient for smaller ministries and with built-in templates to integrate into show files to help with EQ and compression settings and even gain structure, they might offer enough features to help even novice engineers overcome their lack of experience.
However, the idea of “you get what you pay for” is still true. Some higher-priced consoles may offer better integrations with a Dante network, more native plug-ins, more customization for digital audio workstations (DAWs), additional expansion options, and maybe even more possibilities for automation, scripting, and macros to allow multiple functions on separate layers to occur simultaneously.
At the end of the day, though, regardless of any other features under consideration, the console still has to support all of the I/O functions required and needs to help things sound good.
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Paul Ericson, Audio Director, Transformation Church, Tulsa, okla.
Paul Ericson has been the Audio Director at Tulsa’s Transformation Church for the last two years but has spent nearly two decades in the industry. As much as anyone, he knows that for all the features available, churches have to start with the basics.
“I would say the first thing to figure out is how many channels you’ll need on the console to accommodate the physical inputs and buses needed for your situation,” he says. “Then take into account how many channels or buses you will need for mixing. (i.e., reverbs returns, drums bus, vocal bus, band bus etc.). This will greatly affect price and what range of console you will need and then you can start digging into the specifics and features.”
“But I also believe that any console or audio system can be set up as ‘volunteer friendly’ if you take the time to create a good system and method of using it.”
—Paul Ericson, Audio Director, Transformation Church, Tulsa, Okla.
“I’ve found that typically the larger the channel count of a console the more difficult it is to run because typically with size comes more functionality,” he cautions. “But I also believe that any console or audio system can be set up as ‘volunteer friendly’ if you take the time to create a good system and method of using it.”
New consoles may be able to help with common issues like gain before feedback or overcoming poor mic technique, but they may not be able to cover over a multitude of talent-related sins. Ultimately what comes in, goes out.
And sometimes a new console isn’t the answer; it may be that a user needs to get more familiar with the features available on a certain desk before assuming that something newer is the only option. Even if a new purchase is the best path, the first step needs to be research, not just about what’s on the market, but what’s in my community.
What are churches around me using? What can I get my hands on and play with or listen to? Are there others in the industry who can provide trusted guidance and counsel? Any large investment should be made using as much feedback as possible, so a ministry has more comfort that it’s making a wise decision.
For Mount Paran’s Duncan, this was a process that paid immediate dividends.
“We sought the advice of trusted engineers and technicians in the field,” he explains. “In addition to being a church that loves to sing, we also wanted to be a venue for touring artists, so we went with industry standard gear. Not only has the gear served us well on Sundays, but it also serves our guest artists so well that even the largest tour we have hosted left most of their audio gear on the trailer!”
