New audio system funding awarded - opinions needed!

[sdauditorium]

Morning all. After years of working over district officials and jumping through the hoops, I've finally secured a chunk of funding in this year's budget for upgrades to our audio system in our mid-sized auditorium (seats 592). I'll list what the priorities/needs are for the upgrades, and I'd like some input on anything I could be overlooking. More importantly, as I want to make sure we have multiple bids, I'm looking for any references to professional sound install companies that would serve NE Wisconsin and Southern Door County more specfically. I'm already well aware of one that we have a close working relationship with but would like at least 1-2 other bids.

At this point, there is $28,000 in secured funding. We are awaiting notification of a $7,000 grant we wrote and should know by the end of the month. I anticipate at least partial funding of that. Our current system is comprised of a mono center stack with two horns and two low-range cabinets (all EV). The biggest issue with this is the hot spot down our center aisle which covers 15% of seats great but audio intelligibility and coherency at all frequencies drops off remarkably after that. It is driven by a Crown CL2 amp with crossover and EQ. The one-mix monitor feed is run through an QSC GX amp. There is no speaker processing at this point.

Currently, we do your traditional assortment of high school and middle school musicals, various concerts, assemblies, presentations, as well as contracted community performances (bands, solo artists, acrobatic shows, scholarship (read: beauty) pageants. For the contracted performances, we need to hire out systems to provide the needed coverage and tonal quality for these groups. One of the main goals is to provide an audio system that will prevent the need (in all but extreme cases) to hire out sound.

Here are the current priorities I would like to look at; from those that have experience, I'd appreciate any thoughts.

1. House speakers - preferably in L/C/R. The ability to stereo image is important when needed, but more so there should be even coverage of levels across all frequencies. I'm not expecting no drop off, but obviously the less the better.
2. Speaker processing - currently there is none.
3. Monitor mixes - would like to expand to at least 2 mixes for flexibility. Is it worthwhile to do 4 right away to give maximum flexibility for future needs?
4. Additional microphone inputs - only have 10 hard-wired inputs on stage. We have an LS9-32 currently, so to me it makes sense to spec a digital snake at this point instead of running copper. That way it can be moved if needed for pit during musical, band on stage, etc.
5. Extended low frequency/subs - it'd be great to have for contracted artists to give that added bass.
6. Paging/lobby - we currently don't have any but have video monitors in dressing rooms and lobby. We handle calls to curtain through intercom/headset (wired and wireless) which serves the purpose.

I realize that we may not be able to do everything and do not want to compromise quality on the top priorities in order to squeeze everything in. If funding is a bit short, I am more than fine chopping off the last 1-2 items to satisfy the main priorities and doing the other remaining items in the next couple years.

Also, I am issuing a call for reputable sound install companies that I can continue to get a bid put together. I have one as I mentioned before but would like another one or two. Thank for reading my long-winded post.

 

[TheaterEd]

Arrow Audio http://www.arrowaudioinc.com/ installed the system in the last PAC I worked at and they did a great job. They have a L/C/R mix from a digital board and all their cable runs are cat 5, eight inputs on each side of the stage, plus a digital snake for the hard to reach locations. They should be able to find something in your price range.
I am also quite happy with Pro Audio Designs http://www.proaudiodesigns.com/ . They won the bid and did the install at my current location and they work all over Wisconsin. Their customer service has been fantastic and I am very happy with the system they installed for us.

Both of these companies installed systems that meet or exceed your priorities and I would gladly work with either of them. If you would like more information feel free to PM me or I can give you a call.

 

[AudJ]

Sounds exactly like what I did last year. Just finishing the process now. See thread - Bose Panaray in large school auditorium?. We ended up nearly doubling the budget, to about what you are looking at. The system we ended up with is surprisingly a K-Array, will be awesome when completed in the next few weeks.

Definitely bring in a pro, with experience with these types of installs. Ask for references to other work they have done. If your school is anything like mine, the budget process will be your biggest headache. Good luck!

 

[MNicolai]

Hi @sdauditorium,

Professional Audio Designs in Wauwatosa may be able to help you in a couple different capacities. We provide both design/consulting services as well as installation services. We've done work all over the state of Wisconsin and have a number of projects peppered across the Midwest and East Coast.

I briefly spoke with Kim at our office this morning and it sounded like you and her may have already been in contact with one another about this project. Whether that's indeed your project she was thinking of or not, give a holler if there's anything you need or if you're looking for more information on our available services.

Mike Nicolai
Professional Audio Designs, Inc.

 

[sdauditorium]

Thanks for the suggestions; I've put feelers out. Any thoughts on to the basic priorities that I've outlined and/or things I'm overlooking? I should add, maintenance will be able to add any new power needed.

 

[TheaterEd]

That's funny. I've been seeing your posts Mike since I joined, and somehow I didn't put together that you work for pro audio.
Kim has worked Miracles for us!

 

[AudJ]

It is nice to have a power sequencer in the event someone just needs to be able to turn on a microphone when you aren't there. Other ways to accomplish that though. Also consider your school PA, and how it interacts with your system - mute it or cut PA in etc. Definitely something the pros will consider.

 

[chausman]

What is your booth like? Are you going to want some mechanism to move your console into the house?

 

[sdauditorium]

It is nice to have a power sequencer in the event someone just needs to be able to turn on a microphone when you aren't there. Other ways to accomplish that though. Also consider your school PA, and how it interacts with your system - mute it or cut PA in etc. Definitely something the pros will consider.

Good thought. We do currently have a sequencer in our main rack in the booth which takes cares of the amps, sound rack and processing. The mixer is the only equipment that needs to be turned on independently. That's worked out well for us.

 

[sdauditorium]

What is your booth like? Are you going to want some mechanism to move your console into the house?

I've thought about that but with the way our auditorium is constructed, there is no real good place to run a tie-in mid-house without busting up concrete. I figured it might as well be just as easy to run cable from the booth to the mid-house mix position when needed.

 

[carproelsofly]

Are monitor speakers included in "monitor mixes"? Four low-profile wedges would be great to have on hand with the kind of shows you do.

I guess, generally, what do you rent when you bring extra equipment in? That's most likely what you should look at to buy.

Jen

 

[sdauditorium]

Are monitor speakers included in "monitor mixes"? Four low-profile wedges would be great to have on hand with the kind of shows you do.

I guess, generally, what do you rent when you bring extra equipment in? That's most likely what you should look at to buy.

Jen

We currently have four Yamaha 15v wedges that we use, so I'm comfortable with that for now. If I'd have the need to pick up more monitor wedges in the future, I'd just purchase those as needed. I will need to pick up new cable for the wedges though as we're going to switch connectors to speakon (currently 1/4" at the wall plate).

 

[sdauditorium]

Quick question to those experienced with digital snakes. The one specific item I'm looking to spec before I sign off on any upgrade package is Yamaha's 16x8 Digital Stagebox kit as we have the LS9. The question I have relates to the 8 analog outputs. We want to run 3 additional monitor mixes as I've mentioned; however, instead of running that copper would it just make sense to use the 8 analog outputs as the 4 monitor mixes? I'm not sure if there's any issues that I'm not thinking of by doing this, but it seems foolish on the surface to run that copper if the stagebox can do this already.

 

[TheaterEd]

Do your monitors have built in amps? Otherwise that will be an issue.

 

[sdauditorium]

The proposal we have wanted to move the monitor amps to backstage (currently in the booth at the back of the house), so the monitor amps and stagebox would be in the same relative proximity.

 

[TheaterEd]

I don't see that being an issue then.

 

[sdauditorium]

That's what I was thinking. It would allow us to cut out the duplicitous cost of the copper runs. If I wanted to move the stagebox, I could simply run an extra XLR cable as needed. I'm assuming that with an LS9, it's simply patched in and assigned as a normal "Mix" out that is just routed/addressed to the stagebox?

 

[TheaterEd]

That seems like a safe assumption to me. I've never worked with that specific board, but I would be surprised if that isn't the way.

 

[museav]

Unless you issue a comprehensive bid package spelling out specifically what you want from equipment and functionallity to services, documentation, support, training, system warranty, etc. then in my experience what you are likely to get from the mulitiple bids are varying and possibly even conflicting bids that may leave you more confused than ever. There may also be conduit, power, structural and other building related aspects involved in the work that without direction on how to address the related work in the audio bids may be addressed differently in different bids, without such clarification it's not unusual to see some bids include all such work while others specifically exclude it all as "provided by Owner at Owner's cost", which can make quite a bit of difference in the total actual cost of the bid and in what may actually fit your budget or not.

So I suggest either hiring someone with relevant experience to help you put together a good bid package and then having mulitple Contractors bid on that package or talking to multiple Contractors, finding the one you like and then negotiating with them, but getting multiple competitive bids without having a good solid basis for the bids rarely works well from the Owner's perspective.

It depends greatly on the specific space and goals but one issue sometimes I find with mono versus stereo versus LCR and budgets is that you can often plan for eventual LCR but install a nice mono system initially and then use that to justify equal quality for any LR component added later. In comparison, if you try to do all of a LCR system upfront with a limited budget then you often end up having to compromise the entire system to fit it in the budget. That can be especially true if you currently have no left and right speakers are you then likely need to add rigging, structural attachments, cabling paths, etc, for those with that additional cost as well as the additional speakers, amplification and power for it, etc. all having to be covered now. But only you can really determine what are your priorities and the relative value of each portion of the work.

 

[museav]

I also wanted to add that if you're asking for someone to provide a bid for a "LCR" system within a budget it is relatively simply for them to bid a system having left, center and right speakers, however that does not make it an actual LCR system. Providing the proper speaker locations, appropriate coverage over a range of frequencies, desired output from each array, etc. should addressed to get an effective LCR system. I'm basically addressing the difference between getting a usable LCR system and simply left, center and right speakers and with a somewhat limited budget for all that is wanted, if all you ask for is LCR speakers you may just get whatever left, center and right speakers the nidder feels can be supported by the budget rather than an effective LCR system.

The comment about moving the monitor amps backstage, adding processing, etc. is an example of where I would be concerned about potential related costs. If you have an existing space that already has appropriate power and conduit provisions then that might be a relatively simple and low cost change, but if it means adding or relcoating power, providing new conduit/cabling paths, changing the use of a space, etc. then there could be considerable related electrical and architectural costs involved. Unless you tell the audio bidders what to do they may interpret whether they are to include those related costs differently and that could make a huge difference in their bids. If the bids are not 'apples-to-apples' to start then it is not at all unusual for an apparent low bid to turn out to actually be the high bid once the bids are compared on an actual 'apples-to-apples' basis.