With the aim of curing uneven coverage, and improving the clarity and fidelity of its existing sound system, King of Kings Lutheran Church in suburban Woodbury, Minnesota, recently called on Saint Paul-based Collins Electrical Construction – a regional firm that had recently installed a new lighting system for the church – for assistance. Being familiar with the facility, Collins Project Manager Shawn Withrow devised a streamlined, high-performance solution in mind, using components from Electro-Voice and Dynacord.
‘We do a wide range of commercial contracting, often working with Electro-Voice, and it has become my go-to brand for larger spaces like churches,’ Withrow says.
‘We were confident that it was really just a matter of finding the right system to fit the space. For King of Kings, that turned out to be EVA line arrays.’
According to King of Kings Director of Worship Arts, Chris Vorrie, the decision to move on a new system was made several months prior to the pandemic, driven by that desire for greater clarity: ‘With our previous system, the ability to understand the words varied depending on where you were sitting,’ he explains. ‘We needed consistent, highly intelligible sound throughout the nave.’
Needing the system to meet the needs of both contemporary and traditional worship services, Withrow contacted Regional Sales Manager Dave Notch to arrange a loudspeaker demo, incorporating the latest electronics from Dynacord. ‘The demo made King of Kings comfortable with the EVA system, and it’s also why they decided to upgrade to flown dual 18-inch subwoofers,’ he reports.
Electro-Voice and Dynacord’s in-house system design team assisted Collins Electrical Construction in finalising the deployment details, using Ease mapping software in combination with Dynacord SoniCue Sound System Software to ensure coverage throughout the sanctuary. Local company Twin Cities Sound was engaged to handle the physical hanging of the loudspeakers.
The right and left hangs in the primary system each comprise two EVA-2082S 90° horizontal dispersion cabinets atop a pair of 120° models, ensuring even coverage throughout the main seating area. EVA cabinets contain two fixed-splay loudspeaker modules, which means that each hang comprises a total of eight line-array elements. Splay angles are determined by the specific choice of models. The cabinets are mechanically connected with simple rigging plates, which are hidden by cosmetic panels that give EVA a clean and elegant look. The main EVA system benefits from newly-released DSP settings that further enhance acoustical performance and a newly implemented hybrid limiter scheme that maximises system output.
To cover the side seating areas and choir loft, one Electro-Voice EVF-1122S is angled to each side, and two X12i-128 subwoofers are flown further out above the congregation. All the loudspeakers are finished in white. The system is powered by two Dynacord DSP power amplifiers; an IPX20:4 – a model capable of providing up to 20kW via its four channels – handles the arrays and subs, and a single C2800FDi supplies the EVFs.
With services opening up again, the ‘less is more’ value angle is clear to hear for the King of Kings team and their congregation: ‘We really love the sound of the new system,’ adds Vorrie. ‘Musically, everything is enhanced and sounds so much better than before – and we actually eliminated multiple fill speakers in the process. Everything is consistent now, and both the spoken word and lyrics are much easier to understand, no matter where you sit.’
