Worship Confessional 8.26.07
we had a handful of visitors at church yesterday (this is a big deal since we’re between pastors right now and the church always experiences an intense drop in attendance at these times). and, no, its not about the numbers, but its important for our congregation to feel like we are a viable presence in the community.
my husband preached this sunday – gave a great message, but i’m not sure the back half of the congregation could hear him… even AFTER he asked the sound guy to turn up his lapel mic.
not sure why things didn’t get much louder, but i’m sure there’s an explanation. our sound guy gets trapped in a number of mini-battles each month. and he takes it in stride… i’d probably collapse.
i’m learning that when i can’t hear my vocals through the system very well, i have a tendency to sing much louder than is good for my voice….
so today my voice is raspy & tired!
anyway, i left the service feeling frustrated… but more for the preacher than for myself. it was a great message, but i’m afraid it fell on “deaf” ears due to lack of volume. we have a number of older (hearing-aided) members in our congregation, so we’re very aware of the fact that certain frequencies (ie: my voice in through the speakers) hurt their ears while other frequencies (my husband’s voice through the speakers) doesn’t quite reach their eardrums.
its a mystery to me. but one that really needs to be solved in our church… i wish i knew a hearing doctor that could help me understand what’s going on! i can’t figure out why the young people on the first few pews say the sound is too quiet, while the older crowd in the back insists we’re too loud.
any advice here??????
i digress -probably confessing more than you asked for….. just know this: there is a massive generational divide in our church.
its a blessing.
lets get back to our worship service.
Order of Worship:
Prelude
Welcome/Announcements/Prayer
Revive Us Again (#434) – Mackay & Husband – 1863
Prince of Peace – Imboden & Rhoton
Made Me Glad – Miriam Webster
Offering/Doxology
Sermon
I Give You My Heart – Reuben Morgan
My Jesus I Love Thee – William R. Featherston & Adoniram J. Gordon – 1864 – guitar led – very powerful
Benediction
are there photos of the room in question?
a common problem in audio technology in churches is the space under the balcony, or a room that gets smaller in the back, basically you wind up with huge “bass traps” even in serons, where bass doesn’t play in that much, the sound waves reverberate in those kinds of spots , making it extremely loud.
Also I have run into a lot of locations that the speakers are aimed wrong, thus creating sound “vacumes” where it’s just too quite.
Surveying your recent worship confessionals, I have noticed one thing. Your dislike of ‘modern worship’, at least when compared to ‘hymns’, may be partially due to the ‘modern worship’ you appear to be familiar with. I suggest you buy Matt Redman’s last several c.d.’s (beginning with “Where Angels fear to Tread”), both of Vicky Beeching’s releases, for starters. I mean, I love “I give you my Heart”, but lyrically – yes, a song like that DOESN’T have the same depth as the hymns of old. However, I think you’ll find many of the songs off of, to use the above exampled, Vicky’s latest c.d., do.
I know that’s off topic – I am still just trying to make sense of your preference for old songs over new. I think I may be beginning to figure it out.
From the technical side, there are some great options for some of your older folks that need to hear the message better. As with all technical things, there are costs, but they can start small and build over time. if you want any info, just email me.
I like Revive Us Again. We used to do a medley that went from the into Revive Us O Lord, very cool.
Any chance there is an way to hear your hubbies preaching? I’d love to.
“i can’t figure out why the young people on the first few pews say the sound is too quiet, while the older crowd in the back insists we’re too loud.
any advice here??????”
I’ve got it!!! Have them switch places =)
Since we’ve switched to in ears I certainly don’t over sing anymore – but now I find I may not sing loud enough. The only perfect setting for sound, for me, is in the car. Or when I’m just standing around the piano with my husband rehearsing something. Anyways…I’m with b up there, I’d like to hear your man preach too!
You may want to bring in an audio technician who will analyze and EQ your room. Just like there are computer programs to digitally represent the physical architecture of your building there are ways to digitally represent the AUDIO architecture of your room that can give you a picture of what the sound waves “look” like once they come out of the speakers.
Three years ago our church did an A/V renovation and one of the things they found out was that the speakers were angled completely incorrectly for the seating arrangement in our auditorium. This meant dead spots in the front 1/3 of the seats and the loudest points were actually the last few rows – where the older people like to sit. We made some temporary changes and are doing some permanent changes this year to fix the whole situation.
I get frustrated when our system does funny things too. I really feel like it’s a combination of bad equipment and lack of training. We brought a lot of our equipment as hand-me-downs and many of our sound techs have never done this before. So we end up doing a lot of trial and error. I, personally, really want to learn more about sound boards and get the sound techs some formal training. That’s my view.
Our church is divided somewhat generationally too. We have two services (traditional & contemporary, though we do hymns at the contemporary & some contemporary songs arranged for choir in the traditional), but sometimes it can feel like we have two different churches. Some may not agree with me (as in people in our church), but I often think both services are decently tolerant of the other’s music–I don’t think the trad service would like our really strong stuff with more drums & electric guitar, but they do like the slower contemporary stuff, & the contemporary service never complains when our worship leader is moved to go into hymns during the service.
We’re doing ‘I Give You My Heart’ this coming week.
Sorry to derail the conversation, but I want to pick up on this line:
“its not about the numbers”
Surely it IS about the numbers, since numbers equals souls? Perhaps it’s the perspective on the numbers that needs careful approach, but the way I see is it, Jesus told us to go out and compel those on the streets in to His house. He wants it full. Surely that means that the numbers are important?
Mandy,
Many times the sound problems you are having are related to EQ and somewhat mix, not really overall volume so much. Many times it can be a very specific ‘range’ in one instrument or voice that needs to be cut back some to clean everything up. I am not familiar with your band lineup or your sanctuary acoustic characteristics, so it is just a suggestion there. If its a church that has a choral history then often times the mix can reflect that. You end up with a mix with vocal WAY in front because people are used to hearing a choir way in front. In turn, to still hear the instruments well, the mix can get pushed louder than necessary. That will let the older folks hear a bad mix and feel offended, while young folks will still wish they could hear the instruments more.
Also, go in the room, play a CD, set it at a nominal listening level. Walk around the room. See if it really is louder in the front and quieter in the back. If that is the case, consider refocusing your speakers or re-seating your congregants, haha. Maybe when Jess and I are sleeping on your couch next week we can go over and take a look at the room together and I will see if I notice anything funky, or help with some EQs even.
Obviously you are also going to have the young vs. old struggles regardless. Young people like volume, they like it loud enough generally that they can sing comfortably without feeling like they can be heard. On the flip side, many of the older folks will think its too loud as soon as they see a guitar, regardless of what is really happening.
See you in a few days,
Travis
P.S. I have a DVD full of Vibe videos for you.
To affirm Travis’ last statement, I led last Sunday AM with the Youth and before the 8 AM service some of the older members complained OUTSIDE the service while we were still finishing our rehearsal, even though we used a Decibel meter to verify that our volume was no louder than any other weeks. They just saw/heard 2 electric guitars on stage and reacted. Silly, really.
Of course, I do that every time I see a harp – those crazy harpists, always thrashing about with the other hard-core punk kids and straight-edgers. No harp in church, I SAY!
“Harp is of the devil, Bobbeee Booo-shay!”