When Gateway Church opened a new satellite location, it chose Klang:fabrik Immersive IEM mixing as monitoring solution its musicians and vocalists on stage, and also as par of a model for audio in further satellite locations.
With its new satellite in suburban Prosper, the church boasts the largest congregation in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and is among the largest churches in US. Gateway Church Prosper uses four Klang:fabrik immersive IEM mixing units, connected via Madi to a DiGiCo SD12 console at front-of-house for the 1,000-seat auditorium. The Klang and DiGiCo systems – along with a new Meyer Sound Leopard PA system – were provided and installed by Pro Sound & Video as part of a full renovation of the location’s audio infrastructure – made in preparation of it becoming the tenth regional location of the fast-growing church.
Senior Audio Engineer Brandon Conn says they’d been aware of the Klang:fabrik system for some time, having seen demos at trade shows and having had an up-close experience with it at Discovery Church in the Orlando, Florida area. ‘We did a walk-through there and saw the Klang in action, and everyone really liked what they saw and heard,’ he says.
The Klang:fabrik monitoring system offers Gateway Church a combination of high sonic quality and ease of use, which is essential for the largely volunteer audio staff. ‘The sound really is great – that was a comment that everyone had right from the start,’ says Conn, adding that the Klang:fabriks put everyone, all using Shure PSM 900 wireless in-ear systems, in a fully immersive space onstage. ‘They were hearing themselves as never before.’
In terms of operation and control, Conn says that the flexibility of configuration that Klang offers was especially helpful for establishing a new worship location. ‘Klang gives you a set-up option right out of the box that lets you get moving quickly and reliably, lets you see what you’re doing at a glance – the ability to color-code and group things really helps that – and makes the entire system very easy to understand and use.’
Klang’s flexibility has also allowed Conn to configure systems very specifically: the stage signals are sent to the DiGiCo SD-Racks and SD12 FOH console, which are connected on an Optocore loop. The monitor channels are then patched via Madi to the four Klang:fabrik devices, and from there to wireless transmitters and hardwired beltpacks on stage.
There are two hardwired Apple iPads on stage for mix control – one for the Musical Director and one for the drummer. There are also two Dell touchscreen monitors, one at FOH and one stage left, the latter atop a mobile cart that can be moved to centre stage for soundchecks, where the worship band has more freedom to adjust mixes as needed. In total, there are eight stereo wireless mixes and eight stereo wired mixes available.
‘The entire Klang system is wired into a Gateway IT-managed switch on our internal audio VLAN network,’ Conn explains. ‘We purposely chose not to extend this to individual iPhones for each musician at this point. Keeping control by being wired for now gives us a high degree of security and stability, which helps ease the workload on the FOH engineers, and minimises the complexity of the stage mix for them.’
Specifically, Conn adds, using Klang:fabrik paired with DiGiCo consoles and stage racks will be one of the primary and more streamlined models for future satellite Gateway campus locations going forward. ‘It’s a way to simplify the monitoring layout for everyone, including our volunteers, staff engineers and worship teams, and gives us a model that’s easily repeatable for future worship spaces.’
‘We’re looking forward to Klang:fabrik being part of our growth.’
