Small, but warm arts center adds 24C column loudspeakers.
The Cultural Arts Center (CAC) in Lancaster, South Carolina was constructed by the First Presbyterian Church congregation in 1862 and was the first brick church building in the town. In the spring of 1865, the church was occupied by Union troops; cavalrymen led by General Judson Kilpatrick stabled their horses in the sanctuary, using the pews as feeding troughs.
With the departure of the First Presbyterian congregation in 1926, the building was used intermittently for a variety of historical and cultural purposes for the next thirty years. Then, despite best efforts to restore and maintain the building, it gradually fell into decay. In 2008, with the assistance of the City of Lancaster and private donations, the Lancaster County Society for Historical Preservation launched a concerted effort to restore the church structure and bring it back to life as the Lancaster Cultural Arts Center. Two years later the first concert was held in the restored building.
A decade on and the year 2020 brought major changes to the CAC: a spacious vestibule/ lobby, a large ‘green’ room, and new bathrooms for both the audience and performers. As part of this latest renewal, the venue upgraded its sound system. Two 24C cardioid column loudspeakers with 24C-E column extenders are used primarily for speech, background music, and acoustic/unplugged scenarios. The very small, but reverberantly warm venue also presents classical performances, small orchestral pieces, and jazz.
“The 120 seat room has an average delay time of approximately four seconds and is a loud room acoustically,” states Jerry Temple, owner of XL Mediaworks, who installed the d&b system. “Minimal noises such as a door closing resonates within the space and unamplified speech is unintelligible. The space is also used for community meetings and things such as local political debates where intelligibility is required.”
The venue’s early Gothic style architecture features sixteen inch thick walls of plaster specially marked to resemble stone. In order to address the needs of such a challenging space, XL Mediaworks employed the most effective tool to achieve the results that were expected by facility management.
The four inch LF drivers of the 24C are arranged in a unique cardioid setup to deliver significant directivity down to 370 Hz, and when combined with the 24C-E extender, directivity extends down to 190 Hz. The cardioid pattern produces minimal energy behind the loudspeaker, reducing reflections and resulting in balanced level distribution across the listening area to provide a high level of intelligibility.
“Before the installation, voice presentations were barely audible unless one was close to the speaker,” states Johannes Tromp at Lancaster Cultural Center.
