Jefferson College is a public junior college thirty miles south of St. Louis, Missouri in
Hillsboro. It serves over 5,500 full and part-time students who are either seeking to
round out their education for professional advancement or completing an Associate’s
Degree in preparation for a four-year college or university. In keeping with its
mission to foster balanced student growth, Jefferson College provides its students
with a wealth of extracurricular activities, including Viking athletics, theatrical and
musical performances, and outside concerts and public events. The school recently
funded an overhaul and modernization of the sound reinforcement systems in its
2,500-seat field house and in its 300-seat theatre, which included high-performance,
cost-effective Ashly Audio KLR-Series amplifiers in the field house and Dante-ready
nXe-Series network amplifiers in the theatre.
David Bick and Josh Rasch acoustical engineers with McClure Engineering’s St. Louis
division designed both new systems.
The field house’s new sound system starts with two Sennheiser evolution 300-Series
wireless systems, two Sennheiser MEG 14-40 microphones with MAT 133s bases,
and a CD player. Their outputs feed a Shure SCM-810 mixer, which in turn feeds a
Harman BSS BLU DSP system. Two additional Sennheiser evolution 300-series
wireless systems, a CD player, and a series of existing wired inputs directly feed
the Harman BLU DSP system and are controlled in a stand-alone mode by either
BSS Contrio Keypads or via the Harman HiQnet Motion Control app installed on an
iPad. Ten channels of Ashly amplification (one dual-channel 1,000W KLR-2000, two
dual-channel 800W at 70V KLR-3200s, and two dual-channel 2,500W KLR-5000s)
power a distributed system consisting of nine Renkus-Heinz TRX 151/9 loudspeakers
for the main sports arena, four Renkus-Heinz TRX 61 loudspeakers for two low-
ceiling areas in the arena, SoundTube CM890D loudspeakers for the lobby, and
Lowell 810 loudspeakers for the conference room.
The new front end for the theatre consists of ten Sennheiser evolution 300-Series
wireless systems and a Sennheiser MEG 14040 microphone, along with existing
microphones, all of which feed via Dante-networked audio channels through a
Harman BSS BLU DSP. This allows for a complete stand-alone system operation
exclusive of the Allen & Heath GLD-80 mixing console. System control is via the
Harman HiQnet Motion Control app on an iPad and integrated BSS Contrio Keypads.
All Dante network audio channels also feed the GLD-80 as a front-of-house mixer
for use during larger events. The system can be further expanded when additional
channels are needed through the addition of the Allen & Heath AR2412 portable
stage rack. Two new Sennheiser evolution 300-Series personal monitors
complement an existing collection of stage monitors. Output from the GLD-80 feeds
a separate Harman BSS BLU DSP system, which in turn feeds (via Dante) ten
channels of Ashly Audio network audio amplification: one four-channel 800W nXe
8004, one four-channel 400W nXe 4004, and one dual-channel 1,500W nXe 1.52.
The amplifiers power three Renkus-Heinz TRX 81/9 mains loudspeakers in a left-
centre-right configuration and two Renkus-Heinz BPS 12-1 subwoofers. Listen
Technologies assisted listening systems and Juice Goose UPS and TCP/IP-controlled
power sequencers complete both the field house and the theatre systems.
