Most church sound problems do not start with a cheap speaker. They start with where the speakers are hung.
In the video above, Spencer Trefzger, our Director of Design & Engineering, walks through a real PA redesign for a church that called us about an unsatisfying sound environment on Sundays. It’s a clear example of something we see constantly: a system installed with good intentions, deployed in a way that works against the room.
A room where acoustics weren’t the problem
When a church calls about a system that is too loud or never sounds right, the usual culprit is the room. Either it was never treated, or it was treated for choral music with a deliberately long reverb time. In a hexagon-shaped sanctuary like this one, acoustic treatment is often the answer, not a new PA.
This room was the exception. The wall treatment was good, and there was well-hidden ceiling treatment around the edges. That pointed us at the sound system itself.
Geometry is the most common mistake
Spencer’s point is simple: most PA problems are created, and solved, by geometry. The most common mistake we see is a system deployed in the wrong orientation, splitting the room into the wrong zones, or using too many speakers to cover the same seats.
The ideal sound source is a single point, because there is nothing for it to interfere with except the room. Since a single cluster gives up too much level, most rooms use a left-right or left-center-right system. In a left-right system, the goal is to aim each side at the midpoint of its half of the room, as close as the space allows. That puts most listeners on axis with a speaker and uses its full coverage width.
This church had two constant curvature arrays flown front center, roughly 15 feet apart. That created two problems.
Problem one: the arrays overlapped. Constant curvature boxes cover close to 110 degrees, wider than a typical 90-degree point source box, so they can sit farther apart and still meet in the middle. Hung this close, they overlapped across the middle third of the room and canceled each other out, creating what Spencer calls a nasty comb filter over almost every seat there.
Problem two: the side fills. Wall speakers beside the stage were meant to cover the wide edges of the hexagon. Instead, they doubled the number of sound sources from two to four, added a second layer of comb filtering for everyone on the sides, and pulled the sound image away from the stage. A listener on the edge heard the pastor coming from the far wall more than from the person they were watching.
What comb filtering does to a Sunday
If you run pink noise through a system like this and walk the room, the level swings dramatically from seat to seat. Waves cancel completely in one spot and sum to +6 dB a few feet away. On an RTA it looks like the teeth of a comb.
That is why a system like this is nearly impossible to EQ. The right EQ is different in almost every seat. Add a large front-to-back swing, over 110 dB at the front and close to 101 dB in the back in the model, and your volunteer at front of house cannot mix for the room, no matter how skilled they are.
The redesign
Spencer’s design moved the new constant curvature arrays out to 14.5 feet off center and removed the side fills entirely. Each array now covers a good half of the room on its own. With both on, almost the entire seating area sits within about ±3 dB, and front to back lands around ±1.5 to ±2 dB.
Then comes the part that is easy to skip: DSP shading and tuning. The array optimization in the design software maps the coverage area and adjusts the projection for even level front to back and side to side. Geometry gets you most of the way. Tuning finishes it. Any good integrator should do both.
Fewer boxes, less cost
The before and after tells the story: a wall of sound at the front, comb filtering in the middle and a drop-off in the back, replaced by even coverage across the room. And because the new design uses fewer sources, fewer hang points and fewer amp channels, it cost less to deploy than the system it replaced.
As Spencer puts it, geometry always wins. Sound is physics. EQ, DSP and acoustic treatment can improve a well-placed system, but none of them can fix speakers pointed the wrong way or too many speakers in the wrong places.
Start with the right foundation
When a PA is placed right, your team stops fighting the room and starts serving the people in it. The pastor sounds like they are on the stage, the back row hears the same service as the front, and your volunteers can mix with confidence.
If your church’s sound has never felt right, the answer may not be new gear. It may be a better design. Learn how we design church sound systems, or start a conversation with our team.