One of my favorite churches to run sound in was Auburn United Methodist Church. In 2009, we started a new contemporary service called Resonate, designed to offer a more modern worship experience. The goal was to retain longtime members who were looking for something different, something other churches in the area were already offering.
I got to be part of the team that designed the service and the worship space from the ground up.
Starting With a Blank Canvas
There would be no pipe organ or stained glass windows. We repurposed the existing Fellowship Hall, which was completely windowless. That might sound like a limitation, but for audio, it was a gift. No windows meant no reflections off glass, no outside noise, and total control over the environment. We got to make the most of custom lighting, acoustic treatment, and a sound system that was designed specifically for the room.
I worked with my good friends over at Auburn AV to determine exact speaker locations so that every seat got nearly identical coverage. I got to decide where the tech booth would go and how it would be laid out, everything from pull-out equipment racks to an angled trim piece along the top of the half wall surrounding the booth that prevented rogue drinks from getting set down anywhere near the equipment. (If you’ve ever had someone’s coffee take out a channel strip, you understand why that mattered.)
The Gear
We were one of the first owners of a Yamaha LS9 console, which was a brand-new product at the time and packed a lot of capability into a surprisingly small format. I chose the exact drum enclosure I wanted, had custom isolation cabinets built for the guitar amps, and put the entire worship team on Aviom personal in-ear mixers, which was also newer tech at the time.
The result? Near-zero stage volume. Every instrument was isolated and controlled. The only sound in the room was what came through the PA, and as a bonus, I was relieved of any monitor mixing duties, allowing me to focus solely on the house.
Church Sound Guy’s Nirvana
It didn’t take long to get everything dialed in. Once we had our processes in place and established a cadence, I could spend my time actually focusing on the details of the mix instead of constantly chasing problems. If you’ve ever run sound at a church, you know how rare that is. Most Sundays, you’re troubleshooting something. A dead channel, a feedback issue, a last-minute lineup change. At Resonate, I could just walk in, flip the power on, and start mixing.
Listening back to recordings from those services, it’s striking how clean they sound. These weren’t multi-track studio mixes. They were straight off the left-right main bus of the console, exactly as the room heard them. Here are a couple of examples:
And here’s a video from a service that shows the stage layout, the booth, and the console in action:
I attribute the quality to three things:
- A well-treated room. Acoustic panels and careful surface choices meant sound went where we wanted it to go.
- A properly tuned, balanced PA. The speakers were measured, aimed, and EQ’d for the specific room. Every seat heard essentially the same thing.
- Near-zero stage volume. With everything isolated and every musician on in-ears, there was almost no sound on stage competing with the PA. It was like mixing in a giant recording studio rather than a live venue.
Why This Matters for Your Church Right Now
This experience got me thinking about something I hear from churches constantly: “We can’t get our livestream to sound good.”
Here’s the thing. A livestream mix is only as good as what’s happening in the room. If your board mix sounds great, your stream will sound great. If your board mix is fighting feedback, stage bleed, and a boomy room, no amount of post-processing will save it.
The same principles that made Resonate sound like a studio apply to any church trying to improve their sound, whether it’s for the room or the stream:
- Control your stage volume. Get musicians on in-ear monitors whenever possible. Eliminate wedge monitors if you can. The less sound bouncing around the stage, the more control you have at the console.
- Treat your room. You don’t need a full acoustic overhaul. Even modest treatment in the right places, like first reflection points and behind the platform, can dramatically improve clarity.
- Tune your system. A PA that’s been measured and optimized for your specific room will outperform a system that costs twice as much but was just hung up and turned on.
- Mic with intention. Choose the right mic for the source and place it carefully. A well-placed SM58 will beat a poorly placed condenser every time.
I miss those days at AUMC. A talented group of musicians, great equipment, a room that worked with you instead of against you, and a team that had the space to focus on making music sound its best. When all of that comes together, something just clicks. It’s the reason most of us got into this in the first place.
Not every church gets that combination. Most are working with rooms that were designed for something else, gear that’s aging, and volunteers who are doing their best with limited training. That’s reality, and there’s no shame in it. But what Resonate taught me is that the fundamentals really do work. You may not get all the way to nirvana, but every step in that direction makes a real difference on Sunday morning.
If your church is working toward better sound, whether in the room or on the stream, I’d love to hear what you’re dealing with. Sometimes a fresh set of ears is all it takes to find the path forward.