Renkus Heinz makes the grade at transformation of university auditorium into a large multi-purpose classroom, to be used primarily for lectures but also to accommodate feature concerts, films and other special events.

Carrington Hall was the first building to open its doors on the Missouri State University campus in 1908, and has lived through many incarnations since then. Today Carrington Hall serves as the university's administration building, and its previously unused, antiquated auditorium has been renovated and modernised.

To better serve the university's needs, the auditorium has been converted into a large multi-purpose classroom, to be used primarily for lectures but also to accommodate feature concerts, films and other special events.

MSU brought in acoustic and audio visual consultant Coffeen Fricke and Associates to design an audio system for the new multi-purpose classroom. As CFA’s Bob Ledo explains, the building’s stone and concrete architecture created an extremely reverberant environment, albeit a visually interesting one.

“The main seating area is a futuristic looking space designed with linear, angled florescent lighting on the underside of a gigantic cube that makes the large volume space more controllable, but also cuts off the view to the top of proscenium,” says Ledo. The room also features very low under-balcony seating space completely surrounded by concrete.
 
It proved quite challenging for Coffeen Fricke and Associates to find loudspeakers that would provide proper coverage in the hall’s main seating area as well as to the lower under-balcony seating.

“There was nowhere to put loudspeakers in the main seating area,” says Ledo. “We couldn’t use source clusters because the cube was in the way. Using surface-mounted, distributed loudspeakers would have been our least costly solution but definitely the least aesthetically appealing.”

The solution was found in the low profile Iconyx system from Renkus-Heinz. “We only needed two loudspeakers, which we shelf-mounted,” Ledo says. “They blend into the environment so well, they’re not recognisable as loudspeakers.”

The new audio system utilises two self-powered Iconyx IC16-R line arrays located on either side of the stage. The room also employs a simple presenter podium with a gooseneck microphone and a wireless lapel mic, all driven by Biamp Audia DSP.

www.renkus-heinz.com