The Italian Cathedral of Maria Santissima Achiropita comes to life with Bose Panaray

To improve the experience of your followers, the cathedral of María Santísima Achiropita has installed a sound system distributed by zones with 38 speakers Bose Panaray MA12, three PowerMatch MP8500N amplifiers, a ControlSpace ESP-1240X processor and a ControlSpace CC-64 control center.

Con Bose Panaray This 11th century cathedral gains new life for religious ceremonies and musical concerts.

Built in the 11th century, the cathedral of María Santísima Achiropita, en Rosano (in the province of Cosenza – Italia), It was built around the image of the Madonna Achiropita, which is believed to have miraculously appeared on a stone while rising. It consists of four naves and three apses, in addition to a bell tower and a baptismal font dating from the 14th century, elements that contribute to its beauty, but they also represent an acoustic challenge that was recently resolved by MG Tecnosistemi using Bose Professional technology.

The rich history and antiquities make it a revered place that welcomes thousands of faithful throughout the year.. A temple of this importance required offering an experience that included a renewed sound system, but at the same time preserve its atmosphere.

The architecture of the cathedral has an atypical structure. In addition to the central nave and the two lateral naves, like in many churches, the space has a fourth ship located on the west side.

In the acoustic, This structure represents a weak point so previous systems could not provide clear sound, clear and consistent for those who were located in that fourth ship. But the problem was not limited to this space., Well, in the rest of the cathedral, during the ceremonies, both the voice and the music were unclear, a limitation that did not allow musical concerts to be organized and restricted the celebration of relevant ceremonies.

The authorities of María Santísima Achiropita trusted the integrator MG Tecnosistemi. In the first instance, The specialists of this Italian company sought the balance between the integration of necessary technology and respect for the aesthetics of the cathedral.

Besides, It was necessary to solve the reverberation and echo that were generated during the most intimate ceremonies, like baptisms or small funerals, carried out in one or another particular ship.

MG Tecnosistemi engineers set the goal of designing a consistent, high-quality audio solution, adapted to the spaces of the cathedral. So they decided to divide the system into several zones, for which they opted for the technology of Bose Professional products.

Bose sound solution

The resulting solution consisted of a Bose sound system, distributed in several areas with the use of speakers Panaray MA12, offering a linear column array design, installed throughout the cathedral. In a complex acoustic environment like this, The system provides perfect voice intelligibility and top-notch music quality, without being overwhelming or affecting the connection of the faithful with a truly unique space.

The original system included 50 different speakers, while the new multi-zone solution uses 38 Panaray MA12 speakers that achieve better coverage and intelligibility. Ten of them are located in the central nave, 12 They are distributed in the two hallways, four in the altar area to be used as monitors and the 12 The rest were installed in the fourth nave.

To complete the project, MG Tecnosistemi integrated three amplifiers PowerMatch MP8500N, a processor ControlSpace ESP-1240X and a control center ControlSpace CC-64.

An exclusive and easy-to-use interface was designed to manage the system., programmed with a series of presets for the most requested usage scenes within the cathedral, enabling powerful performance, simple and hassle-free.

The resulting audio experience offers everything the temple, the priests and the community waited and gave new life to the space, so that it meets a broader range of needs of routine worshipers and sporadic visitors, as well as preserving the magic of this site and ensuring that it remains a source of inspiration for the future.

"At the moment, each of the areas of the cathedral is covered and independent. If you need one of them for a specific celebration, You can select the appropriate scenario and all settings are applied automatically”, shares Pietro Madeo, parish priest of the María Santísima Achiropita cathedral. “Noise is no longer produced by microphone feedback or other negative audio effects that were generated with the previous system. The choir music is heard perfectly, even from the back of the cathedral, and with the same audio quality that people sitting in the front enjoy”.