Founded by the Daughters of Charity in 1862, Saint Agnes Hospital is a full-service teaching hospital in Baltimore, Maryland with residency programs in medicine and surgery.
- As part of a recent expansion program, Saint Agnes renovated its chapel in 2013. The newly renovated chapel retains historic features like a circular stained glass window but includes new marble floors and freshly painted walls.
- The hospital knew that the chapel would need a new audio system. The existing audio system had uneven coverage and poor sound quality and the existing pendant loudspeakers didn’t match the chapel’s new appearance.
- Anne Buening, vice president of Mission Integration at Saint Agnes, contacted Joe Schwartz of HP Electronics who recommended an audio system using a Community ENTASYS 212 loudspeaker. “I had worked with Anne on another church sound project using ENTASYS,” said Schwartz, “and I knew ENTASYS could do the job despite the acoustic difficulties presented by the new marble floors and painted walls.”
- Schwartz designed a new audio system for the chapel using a single ENTASYS 212 on one side. His calculations showed that a single ENTASYS could cover the entire chapel well and he wanted to avoid a challenging wiring path to the other side. He completed the system with a new DSP and power amplifier, a pair of wireless microphones and a gooseneck mic for the lectern.
- Anne Buening noted that the system was finished in time for a special “Healing Hands” ceremony honoring three physicians in December. She commented, “Several of the hospital’s management staff were present at the ceremony and said they could hear everything very well,” Schwartz added, “I was very pleased with the results. The single ENTASYS is discrete yet it covers the chapel very well and we were able to complete the job within the hospital’s budget. The affordability of the entire ENTASYS 200 series is unprecedented for this level of loudspeaker.”
