Seven Key Steps to Great Sound

December 19, 2024•5 min read

There are a myriad of things that you as a pastor, worship leader, or church administrator could do to improve the quality and consistency of the sound in your worship services. Here are seven simple steps you can take that will guarantee an immediate improvement.

1) Encourage and honor your sound team.

The only recognition that most church sound engineers get is when things go wrong, like a problem with a mic not being on when it should be. It’s an unseen, helps ministry so the lack of appreciation comes with the territory. Few people think to applaud the sound engineer.

Encourage them privately and honor their efforts publicly - from the pulpit – on a regular basis. When something goes wrong, make an effort not to embarrass them, especially not in front of the congregation. Things are going to happen, even to the most experienced sound technician. If you notice a pattern, then help them recognize the problem offline, after the service.

2) Communicate with your sound team.

Nothing hurts an organization more than a lack of communication. Go out of your way to communicate any changes with this weekend’s service to your sound team. Include them in on your planning sessions for all services and special events as early as possible.

Communicate last minute changes quickly! Details that you may take for granted, or think unimportant, may be the very pieces of information your sound team needs to do their job right.

Most tech volunteers have detail type personalities with a fair measure of musician’s ego mixed up, ‘er, in. They have a genuine desire to do the job right, and freely invest hours of their lives to make sure things go smoothly.

3) Please – Do Soundchecks!!!

Your musicians and singers probably rehearse the material for the worship sets quite a bit. Why on earth do so many churches expect their sound team to deliver a flawless performance on Sunday morning without providing them ample time to rehearse with the worship team prior to the service!?!

I don’t get it! If you refuse to schedule soundchecks and rehearsals, then please don’t find yourself complaining to your sound team about the poor job they are doing with the sound.

4) Pray with your sound team.

Pray with them for solutions to the technical and relational problems they are facing right now. Invest time in understanding and helping them work through any relational problems that may exist. What better place for Satan to drive a wedge of disunity than between the sound team and worship team? Their gift of service – and yours – are equal in God’s eyes.

Also, there are solutions to the technical problems you are facing right now. Pray through to the right solution. God may reveal a solution that your team can implement, or He may lead you to the right individual to assist you in solving the problem.

5) Equip and support your sound team.

Equip them with the gear and the liberty to deliver the quality of sound you want in your worship service. From the pastor to the worship leader to that little old lady in the front pew, everyone involved has an idea of what they want the worship time in their church to sound like.

And church sound engineers across the country are crying out for quality equipment to deliver that elusive sound, but often their hands are tied by a lack of budget and understanding from the church administration.

Also, encourage their creativity by allowing them to experiment. Blanket rules like “the piano lid will stay closed at all times” stifles their creativity to find the best sound. As important as this ministry is, the truth is that no one is going to lose their salvation over how the piano was miked, so let your team experiment and learn in the process.

6) Start and maintain a sound equipment budget.

Let’s face it – a high quality sound system is a requirement in order to do justice to the contemporary style of praise and worship so popular today. Once it becomes a physical entity, it will require regular maintenance and periodic upgrading. That’s a reality.

So just as the church plans for replacing burned out light bulbs, it is simply good stewardship to budget for sound equipment repairs like replacing broken mic cables and so on. Also budget for equipment upgrades. Your sound system would benefit from a complete replacement every ten to fifteen years on the basis of technological advancements alone.

7) Invest in your sound team.

My prayer for pastors and church administrators alike is that they would come to recognize the long term value of investing in their sound team. They have made a significant investment by volunteering their time and talents to ensure that your worship services will go smoothly and sound the best they know how to make it.

That gift of their time is far too often stolen from time they should have spent with their families, and even while it was misplaced, it was a sincere effort of serving the Father with a heart toward excellence.

One of the best return investments you can make as a church on their behalf is to send them to an event like a Church Sound Boot Camp once a year. Pay their way!

Attending seminars as a team helps each individual grow in their knowledge of the craft through which they serve the needs of their church, and it helps your team grow closer together with the bond built through that common experience. You probably couldn’t afford to pay them what their service is worth. In that light, it’s money well spent.

You should supplement that annual training with technical materials that the team can share and study throughout the year. There are many books, videotapes and internet videos available for your team to learn from. But be careful. There is a lot of technical information available that is confusing, and some that is just plain wrong.

So see, there are steps you can take to improve the quality of sound in your worship services. Start putting these seven steps into action today and watch the technical excellence of your worship services increase before your eyes.

Well, what are you waiting for!?!