Wireless audio is an essential component of all styles of modern worship, from contemporary to traditional, but it takes on even higher levels of importance for special and seasonal event production. That will be on display on Sunday, April 17, this year, when thousands of churches worldwide undertake their annual Easter productions. These will range from simply some additional musicians onstage to elaborate, professional-caliber theatrical events. For all of them, the wireless microphones that they rely on for every service during the year have to perform flawlessly for often much larger congregations. Special events often require an extended presentation space, meaning flawless wireless performance is needed in parts of a sanctuary not typically used on most Sundays, and some churches will add a dozen or more additional channels of wireless for more robust productions that may run for a week or longer. Simple or sophisticated, no matter what the special event calls for, AV systems integrators can rely on technology and products from RF Venue, Inc., a leading global developer and manufacturer of antenna and RF communications products, to assure their house-of-worship customers that their wireless audio will meet every challenge.
“When it comes to RF management, our perspective is always that no matter the size of the venue or the event, the key is that the wireless audio always be reliable and free of distractions,” states Zach Lahm, Senior Solutions Engineer at AV systems integration firm HouseRight in Lexington, Kentucky. “In fact, wireless audio is so important to all house-of-worship sound that we make sure that RF management is part of the conversation from the very beginning of a project.” Lahm points out that dropouts – always the main gremlin of wireless audio – are a challenge for any church service, including those done online, where much worship had to migrate during the Covid pandemic. But even more perniciously, dropouts will also become part of the archived sound for services that are recorded for later playback. “They’ll be there forever then,” he warns. Thus, when his church clients prepare for special events, he’ll recommend additional RF management systems be put in place, which almost always means solutions from RF Venue. “Additional musicians or vocalists, or more presenters, means more channels of wireless microphones, so we have to enhance the RF management to accommodate the additional channels,” he says. “That could mean temporarily installing extra antennas, such as the RF Venue Diversity Fin antenna, in other areas of a church where the production might extend to where they wouldn’t normally need RF coverage, such as a lobby,” he explains. “Then, depending on the number of additional RF channels, we’d also deploy a DISTRO4 distribution amplifier that distributes diversity RF and DC power across up to five wireless microphone receivers. And if they need IEMs, we can go to the RF Venue CP Beam Combine8 package, a wireless distribution solution for up to eight channels of in-ear monitoring. RF Venue has a solution for every scenario we might encounter for special events, and we rely on them for that.”
Wireless signal dropout issues faced by houses of worship can be effectively eliminated with the unique remote antenna systems available from RF Venue, whose Wireless Microphone Upgrade Packs and In-Ear Monitor Upgrade Packs provide the complete systems necessary to improve wireless reliability, including all the cables and hardware necessary. RF Venue upgrade packs are simple to implement and work with all wireless mic and monitor systems, regardless of brand, with no tuning or adjustments needed. And for combating high interference levels, churches can simply plug in RF Venue Bandpass Interference Filters to mitigate interference from LED lighting, video walls and 5G cell phones.
