The Belonging Co is an interesting, home-grown, Tennessee church with a unique founding story. In 2014, Henry and Alex Seeley, who held the first services in their home with just four people at the first meeting. Today, the church has 6,000 members, who gather for services — Sunday services and Tuesday night services featuring traveling groups — at The Belonging Co campus in Nashville and at second site in Columbia, 50 miles away.
Challenge
To enable the introduction of concurrent services at a theater in Columbia, a 45-minute drive south, The Belonging Co began streaming live audio and video from its Nashville service over IP to the new satellite site. For the Columbia services to flow smoothly and in sync, robust communications between worship leaders in Nashville and the production teams at both sites are essential.
The Belonging Co is known for dynamic live experiences, and the production team frequently must pivot to respond to impromptu shifts as services take place. In establishing a communications system for production teams — primarily made up of non-technical volunteers — at and across the Nashville and Columbia sites, The Belonging Co needed an intercom system that allows people to hear and speak with only the right people, free from distracting chatter, so that they can focus on the message and on their role in the production.
“For the team working behind the scenes, having the ability to communicate — and hear only what you need to hear — is incredibly important to staying in sync with the stage,” said Andy Rushing, Technical Systems Director at The Belonging Co. “We have a small staff and raise up servant leaders, mostly volunteers, from within the church. Because they rely heavily on communications as they gain and share experience, we place a high priority on our intercom system.”
To allow for continued growth and for special events or venue rentals, the church also needed an intercom system that could scale, integrate with infrastructure, and interconnect with ease.
Solution
Working with systems integrator Diversified, The Belonging Co deployed a Riedel Communications solution built on the company’s Artist digital matrix intercom system and Bolero wireless intercom system, with a dozen Bolero beltpacks and a handful of base stations and tabletop stations.
The IP-based pipeline developed by the church in collaboration with Diversified and Riedel has allowed The Belonging Co to establish communications between team members at the Nashville and Columba sites to support coordination of church services. With preconfigured settings ensuring that every user is connected to just the right sources and groups, people at different sites can speak to one another with confidence and ease. Rather than use cell phones and text messages, or even a partyline crowded with unwanted noise, they enjoy a dedicated system that allows them to adapt on the fly and work together to create a unique live experience.
The Riedel solution even feeds clicks and counts and cue tracks along with the Nashville music director’s mic so that the lyrics director in Columbia can hear it all in real time. Rushing says that having access to these sources has been transformative to the experience of everyone in Columbia who isn’t part of the band and that they no longer feel as though they are playing catch-up.
Result
“Riedel has a tremendous reputation in the house of worship market, and our experience with the company has been fantastic,” added Rushing. “While the intercom solution has played a vital role in enabling us to expand, ultimately, we have been most happy with the fact that communication is no longer getting in the way. People are what make the experience at The Belonging Co great, and Riedel’s Artist and Bolero systems eliminate barriers so they can make it happen.”
Because Riedel gear is widely available, The Belonging Co can easily augment its communications infrastructure and equipment on an as-needed basis, renting to scale up capacity on a temporary basis or investing in further gear as the church’s future growth demands.
