Located in Plaistow, east London, Glory House is a family-based, multi-racial and multi-cultural church where audio and visual technologies have been embraced to broadcast the church’s message in the most effective way possible.
Music is an integral part of Glory House: up to a 100-strong Gospel choir and musical director being complemented by an in-house technical sound team. The church’s sound is done on an extremely professional basis, so when a suitable quality sound reinforcement system was installed in late 2006, Turbosound Aspect® was the obvious choice.
Supplied and installed by South London-based Subfrantic Production Services, the Turbosound system comprises four TA-500 Aspect Wide mid-highs, four TSB-118 subs and six TXD-15M wedge monitors, all controlled by two LMS-D24s. Subfrantic also supplied amplifiers, mixing consoles, outboard equipment, microphones, a custom-designed multicore and an ASL communications system.
“The main factor dictating the specification was to get the best sound we could on a realistic budget for the church,” says Subfrantic’s Steve Davies. “The auditorium is around 30-40m long and 10-12m wide, with a ceiling height of around 5m. It is a lot of area to cover.”
He continues: “The other main challenge was to meet the church's ever-evolving needs, which meant putting a system design together that could be as flexible as possible from the outset. The majority of the music is gospel, but the hall is also used for other concerts, which had to be factored into the system design.
“The Aspect Wide enclosures are well suited to the church as they sound great but are very cost-effective. Due to their dispersion we can also use fewer of them which means smaller unsightly speaker hangs.”
Minimizing the visual impact of the system was essential, because Glory House is very progressive in its technical approach. It has wholeheartedly embraced the era of wide-access television and webcasting to broadcast its message, so a low-profile audio system was essential. This approach also extended to the stage, which led to a monitoring solution rarely seen on all-but the very biggest of stages—the wedges being hidden sub stage, under specially designed metal plates.
With the system installed, Subfrantic has provided a program of training for the church’s technical department, tailored exclusively to its needs, and has received an overwhelmingly positive response.
“Everyone at the church has noticed a huge improvement in the sound, not simply in the auditorium but also on stage,” says Davies. “We have had nothing but compliments and the technical team there are very happy with what they now have to play with!”
In addition, Subfrantic themselves are very impressed with Aspect, so much so that a major investment in the system is just around the corner. “Aspect sounds awesome,” Davies smiles. “We are just about invest in a new 12 stack system and have plans to add a second 12 stacks later in the year.
“Although the Aspect Wides naturally don’t throw as far as the narrows, they are a different box designed for a different application and are outstanding in their own right. Plus they’re incredibly cost effective!”