Saint Matthew’s Episcopal Church serves one of the oldest and largest parishes in the affluent Pacific Palisades suburb of Los Angeles.

The sanctuary’s stunning architecture, with soaring ceilings and exquisite glass work, has long suffered from problematic acoustics and an inadequate sound system, however.

‘A lot of the complaints about the previous systems had to do with speech intelligibility and coverage,’ Daniel Bae, Project Manager for Sierra Madre-based Platt Design Group, explains. ‘The room isn’t very deep, but it is very wide, so time alignment was a major problem.’

‘When the sanctuary was first built, we had two speakers on the ceiling,’ says Jeremias Mendez, the church’s Plant Manager for more than 30 years. ‘One side of the room was completely dead - people were only able to hear the sermon from a few seats.’

‘It’s my understanding that the sanctuary’s architecture was designed to make the most of the choir and organ, and not the sermons,’ adds parishioner Jim Dutka, the project leader behind the drive to upgrade the church’s audio system.

Dutka and company contacted Platt Design Group, who recommended a pair of Renkus-Heinz Iconyx IC-Live steerable arrays, placed on either side of the proscenium.

Unsurprisingly, respecting the Moore Ruble Yudell design of the sanctuary was a major concern: ‘Renkus-Heinz provided custom paint for the IC-Live cabinets, helping them to blend almost invisibly into the sanctuary’s beautiful architecture,’ says Bae.

‘We have a number of older parishioners who have traditionally relied on hearing-assisted technology systems every week,’ says Dutka. ‘Since we’ve installed the new system, many of them have come to us and informed us that they no longer need the assisted listening. I’m proud to say we now have one of the finest audio systems in the area.’

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