The Jimmy Swaggart Ministry banks on myMix
Published: WORSHIP
WORLD: The Jimmy Swaggart Ministry based in Baton Rouge has put its faith in one of the largest myMix personal mixing systems to be installed in a house of worship. A 92 channel system has been installed into the music-focused ministry.
Grant Embury, head technical director, first saw myMix in action while freelance mixing in New Orleans. He saw its potential and realised that it is exactly what the ministry needed to clean up the stage volume for its 5,000 seat sanctuary. ‘Music is so important to what we do. There really is only the sermon and the music,’ explained Mr Embury. ‘The music is key; every time it is something new and fresh—never repeated.’
The ministry organised a demo through myMix manufacturer Movek. Ethan Miller and Devin Villery of local partner Advanced Audio Video Technologies were responsible for doing the demo and Mathias von Heydekampf, owner of Movek was also present. ‘The demo makes the sale’ said Mr von Heydekampf often states. ‘We rely on good demo dealers like Advanced Audio Video Technologies because we know that the product is being introduced as it should be.’
The full demo was scheduled with all 10 musicians and 10 vocalists, including Jimmy Swaggart. The set up was used for their afternoon rehearsal of the regular evening international live broadcast. By the end of the rehearsal, Mr Swaggart announced, ‘I have never heard a smoother sound on stage.’ The HOW went live that evening with myMix powering everyone’s sound.
Advanced Audio Video Technologies has installed the large scale system into the ministry’s existing analogue console. The system consists of 20 myMix personal mixers, three myMix IEX-16L-A 16 channel input expanders, a pair of myMix Power8 and a single myMix Power12 Ethernet switch. Added to this is a myMix Control, network interface for web browser remote control.
This set up gives the ministry 92 channels on the network from which its musicians can pick and choose. Having options was a big deciding factor for Mr Embury. ‘Because of its digital networking capability, myMix has the advantage of a massive pool of audio. We can substitute channels and pick and choose on the fly, without limitations.’
Even though the facility has its own recording studio, the recording feature will allow musicians to take home their SD cards with the multi-tracks on it so they can practice at their leisure. Profile settings is something that Mr Embury is just beginning to explore, but has said that going forward, this will be an important feature to allow for quick change overs.
‘myMix has quickly become instrumental in improving the quality of our performances and our recordings,’ stated Mr Embury. ‘The musicians hear better and so they play better. The flexibility and capability of myMix simply can’t compare with anything else out there.’