Long Beach, MS (October 1, 2014)—Like much of the surrounding area, St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church in Long Beach, MS was affected by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Slammed by 20-foot swells, its sanctuary—and most everything in it, including the audio system—was made uninhabitable.
When it came time to restore the church, Magnolia Music’s Tony Strong and Rain Jaudon recommended a Renkus-Heinz ICONYX IC24-R-II digitally steerable line array loudspeaker system, but church officials opted to look for ways to cut costs. “Someone at the diocese decided to take the preliminary designs and put them out to bid,” said Jaudon. “After some value engineering was done, the project was awarded to another integrator, and the new design called for a lower priced, digitally steerable array.”
The budget system was mounted 12 feet above the floor, but ultimately did not deliver. Next, a new, more powerful point source line array system was installed. “With the second system, the folks right in front of the arrays were being blown away with sound and intelligibility was poor in the rear of the room,” said Strong.
Church officials once again reached out to Strong and Jaudin, and the consultants again suggested IC24Rs. “We demoed the IC24, and it was clear that we could cover the congregation evenly and consistently,” said Strong. “The bottom line of the story is that, with the ICONYX arrays, we selected the right tool for the job. After six years and thousands spent on other systems, they purchased the right system for the job. Now, the ministers are free to do what they do best – minister – without having to deal with complaints about the sound system.”
Renkus-Heinz
www.renkus-heinz.com
