A Midas PRO6 emerged the clear winner for the World Outreach Church in Murfressboro, Tennessee, US when selecting a console for its new 2,800 capacity main sanctuary. “The sound quality and navigation are unbeatable,” reports church technical director Derric West.
West got to work demoing several different consoles onsite while the new sanctuary was in its design phase, swapping test consoles in an existing sanctuary every other weekend, but keeping the same mics and PA. “The console was the only variable,” reports West, “and it was any easy choice once we put the PRO6 in.”
The church are veteran Midas users with Midas Legends already installed in two other sanctuaries. West is delighted that the PRO6 delivers the same Midas sound first made famous by its analogue consoles. But the user-friendly design, along with the flexibility and portability offered by the digital PRO6, has really impressed the church, which has a full and diverse calendar of events where the engineers are more often weekend volunteers rather than full-time professionals.
Regular services are likely to include around six vocals in addition to the pastor, choir and soloists, plus contemporary bands with drums, bass, guitars, keyboard and additional vocals. West configures the PRO6 with 80 inputs to facilitate swapping bands and inputs with an internal patch. String and percussion sections are added for special occasions such as Christmas when West is delighted to be able to rehearse for the larger events, store the settings and build on the mix and scenes as he goes without disturbing the set-ups for weekend services.
But the console really comes into its own at Easter, when the church moves temporarily to Middle Tennessee University’s basketball arena to accommodate congregations of some 20,000. “We will just pack up our PRO6 and take it with us,” says West. “We’ll be able to store all the rehearsals settings and scenes in the weeks prior to Easter, saving hours of set up and sound check once we are set up at the arena.”
While West reports that the PRO6’s capacity for scene storage and recall was “a real selling point for us”, he also highlights the VCA and POP(ulation) groups as personal stand out features. “Also the comps, gates, verb and delay – the internal processing sounds great plus I love the sound and responsiveness of the channel EQs.”
As well as its own productions the church hosts a number of concerts by visiting Christian artists throughout the year. “They use our PRO6 if they’re not already on tour with their own console,” reports West, “and they’ve all been very happy with it!”
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