Announcements

In February, multi-platinum recording artists Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith teamed up for a multi-city U.S. tour that reunited the two iconic singer/songwriters for the first time on the road together since the early 90’s.  CTS Audio was chosen to provide audio production for this landmark tour.  To ensure that fans in every seat were able to thoroughly enjoy this reunion of talent, CTS Audio flew a JBL Vertec 4888/4880/4886 Line Array powered by I-Tech HD 12000 amplifiers.  A Digidesign Profile Console was deployed for FOH, along with a Yamaha PM5D for Monitors.  Representing one of the first audio companies to do so, the CTS team beta-tested the Performance Manager by System Architecture.  In addition the audio crew applied the brand new Version 5 Tunings software (provided by Harman) to monitor and adjust the individual zones within the array.

The Spring portion of the tour visited 20 cities across the country, including Los Angeles, Chicago, Omaha, Minneapolis and Columbus (Ohio), among others and was such a raving success that a fall route was put together to extend the tour.  There are still a few remaining fall dates and tickets are available.  For more information or for tickets, visit: http://amygrant.com/tour/

Choosing to renovate a vacated Kroger grocery store in Spring Hill, TN, The People’s Church (a prominent Southern Baptist Congregation and Willow Creek Association Member led by Senior Pastor Rick White) asked CTS Audio to create a state-of-the-art worship facility in their new worship center.  The new Spring Hill campus is the first plant for The People’s Church, Franklin, TN and is led by campus pastor, Brandon Porter. The Sunday message is delivered via video recorded at the 9:00 am service at the Franklin Campus and then played back at 11:00am for the Spring Hill congregation. Since the video playback is such a critical part of the service for the new campus, CTS installed a Christie WU12K-M 10000 lumen 1920×1200 DLP projector on a 20.5’ x 11.5’ screen for Sermon Playback which is transported using Fast Forward Video (FFV) Micron HD Hard Drive Recorder/Player.  To ensure crystal clear recording of the sermon, a Panasonic AG HPX370 Camera was integrated into the video system set-up at the Franklin campus.

With a capacity of over 1000 seats, CTS Audio outfitted the worship center with NEXO GEO S12 line arrays and NEXO RS15 subwoofers.  Utilizing the church’s existing Aviom system, the CTS install team set up a monitoring package integrating Shure wireless mics (6 channels of ULXP with Antenna Splitters) and Sennheiser IEM’s (2 channels with Antenna Combiners). A Crestron Control system was set up to control the projector system and screen using an iPad station.

When asked about the installation, Brandon Porter commented, “We are extremely pleased and blessed to have worked with CTS Audio. They bent over backwards to work with us through every step of our process. We feel confident that we have absolutely the best audio-video system and installation for the absolute best price that we could have possibly gotten. On top of all of that, we really like these guys! We would definitely work with them again.”

CTS Audio spent a week in Gaylord, Michigan, providing live sound reinforcement for the main stage and the rock stage at Big Ticket Festival. Set in upstate Michigan, Big Ticket Festival is an annual event where people come to camp, hear great live music and get to know more about God’s word.  The weather was beautiful and the attendance was great for this three day show.

The main stage was handled by a four man crew including Jon Schwarz at FOH, Weston Smith on MON, Brooks Abbott, and Jeremy Bayne on Stage patch.  There were a lot of great engineers and bands that played throughout the festival including Switchfoot, Newsboys, Casting Crowns, Family Force Five, Brandon Heath and Third Day, just to name a few.  The enviroment was wonderful as it  felt like a big family reunion as friends and colleagues kept showing up. It was an awesome experience with smooth load ins, and fast efficient soundchecks that resulted in flawless shows for the all involved. Both the client and the audience got to enjoy the work that went into making a show run so effortlessly.  “To have a crew work together for the 5 days it takes to make a festival happen is not always an easy thing, but this crew showed excellence and did it with a smile on their face”, exclaimed Peter Khosla the lead director of Big Ticket.

The rock stage was also handled by CTS Audio.  CTS deployed one of their Mobile Sound Stages and the crew made up of Peter Streiff at FOH, Tony Galyon at MON, Ben Batdorff at Stage Patch and Charlie Bowker on lights worked flawlessly thru the day.  With bands like Decyfer Down, Superchic[k], Fireflight, Disciple and Attaboy throughout the day, expectations can be high, but CTS was able to run thru a tight timeline and keep on schedule without rushing any of the bands.  The CTS crew looks forward to going back to Michigan next year to reconnect with friends and colleagues.