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Multi-Function Venue Selects Allen & Heath
The venue is a converted 1930's super-cinema, which has been extensively renovated in its original art deco style by current owners, Bath City Church. It has played host to a number of internationally-acclaimed artists including the London Symphony Orchestra, Dave Brubeck, Stephane Grappelli, Jacques Loussier, John Williams, the Brecker brothers, the Blind Boys of Alabama, Jan Gabarek, Michael Nyman, and George Shearing, whose 1992 CD "Live At The Forum" was recorded there.
The Forum's main function is as the home of Bath City Church, a vibrant Christian group with a growing membership of around 500 people. The auditorium is equipped with a sound system operated by a team of 15 volunteers from within the church, comprising four teams of three sound engineers working on a rota basis, plus two riggers and a team leader.
The original system was installed in the early 1990's, and after years of heavy use the mixing desk was becoming worn and no longer had the capacity to support the church's developing vision for music and creative arts.
"Selection of a suitable replacement desk was a project in itself. Not only would the desk need the capacity to support the regular church meetngs - which usually involve a lively 7- or 8-piece band with 3 or 4 singers - but to be able to run larger, and sometimes high-profile events in performing areas such as music, dance, drama, and multi-media," commented team leader, Chris Stone. "Good monitoring capabilities were essential, together with the need to be able to operate the FOH mix and monitor mix from the same desk. Sufficient outputs for recording and providing an audio feed to video operations were also necessary."
A number of desks were compared and a 40-channel Allen & Heath GL3300 was selected, configured for 32 mono and 8 stereo channels. A key feature was the ability to use the 8 aux channels either in pre-fade or post-fade mode, and the flexibility through setting internal links to configure them to give 7 pre-fade monitor outputs and a post-fade effects send.
"The GL3300 has been found to give a cleaner sound, which has been particularly noticeable on vocals. The engineers running the desk have found the individual channel metering to be a useful improvement on the previous desk and overall, the desk is clearly laid out and straightforward to use. The main benefit is that the worship team now has the equipment to run meetings without worrying about the technology getting in the way," concludes Stone.
In picture: the 1700-seater auditorium in Bath's The Forum, which now sports an Allen & Heath GL3300.
26th January 2005
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