Theloniouslopez:

Your question, being purely practical, has a practical solution. Your goal should be to get as close to "natural" sound as possible. Teach singers to sing as if the microphone isn't there. Teach voice projection as if the microphone isn't there. Let the sound engineer make the system cooperate with you, rather than the other way around.
Better yet, sing the epistle, Gospel and so on, because the musical tone carries better than the spoken.


Now that I have answered the purely practical aspect, let me take this a step farther.

The Church building needs to allow and encourage singing. Hard surfaces, choir lofts, an absence of carpets, hanging tapestries (banners....) and similar things help. There has to be an option between Chartres Cathedral and Our Lady of the Angels, Los Angeles. Look at the California missions.

At Mass today, I noticed that the two singers were NOT on the same pitch; one was about 3-5 cents away from the other, despite organ accompaniment. Making it worse, they each had their own mike (in the traditional choir loft.)

Returning from communion, I snuck a look and figured out why the pitch-problem: they were standing about 3-4 feet apart. They could not hear each other sing.

So if you're going to mike your singers (a bad idea in the first place) at least force them to stand together so they can sing on the same pitch--if they're able to listen and match.

Among our amateur singers (speaking of the choir, that is) deviations of 20 ct are not unusual ...

I have some singers that sing in mystical keys - they don't exist in nature. Consider yourself blessed.

Gee, dad29: wouldn't it be easier to solve this by giving them monitor headphones than by repositioning them?

That's where proper instruction comes in. A properly produced tone will carry.

Based on what I saw--from 50'--one of the singers was a very young girl, the other was early 20's. My pure guess was that the younger one was uncertain of the music she was singing, which usually results in pitch problems.

So. Un-trained, probably; under-prepared, near-certain.

The solution is not more electronics; in that church, un-miked voices carry well. The solution is better knowledge of the music, proximity to the better singer, and (thus) the confidence to sing out. On pitch.

In Aus we call lots of companies that tailor suit and they give us their quote

The local RC church has the "prep" problem in spades. Some people should never be choir directors.

For a year, I joined the local church's choir. At that time, a new (female) choir director was in charge. She had very good vocal training, and passed that on to the choir. It was clear that this was her first directing gig; her technique was lacking, but she was a good heart.

After only six months, she left the position and the organist added 'director' to his title. Things went south immediately. He would bring out sheet music, send out MP3's, and--with only 30 minutes of actual choral rehearsal plus MP3 time at home, have the choir sing the music. I MEAN 30 minutes, by the way, for pieces running 4-8 octavo-sized pages in (usually) 4 parts.

Some of the choir members knew the music, but most did not, and it sounded that way. Complicating things, he was directing from the bench and he moved the console to the Gospel-side of the loft, so that the choir--if they were watching him at all--had to face leftward, off-axis, to see him. The good news is that his direction was utterly minimal. The bad news is that his direction was utterly minimal; in combination with the incredibly brief rehearsal time, this often resulted in shipwrecks, with one section of voices breaking into 3, or being reduced to only 1 voice singing the part.

Added to that, the man had no clue whatsoever about choral technique; it seemed that he thought good choral singing dropped from the heavens like the quality of mercy. Rhythms were askew, entrances/exits were randomized, enunciations were strictly to individuals' tastes, and phrase-endings were sung at forte, just like the mid-phrase! Pitch problems due to mechanics-problems were not resolved because this poor fellow had no idea how to fix them.

At his direction, mikes were set up with the usual results: a few singers were heard in the nave, and the organ was heard very well in the nave because the mikes were placed very badly, indeed.

He didn't care. He was bound and determined to stuff 15-20 new pieces of music through that choir in the 9-month season, and he did. And it sounded like that, too.

There's more, but there's no time.

It is astonishing that nobody else cared, either. That's how situations like that are allowed to exist: nobody, including the pastor, cares enough or knows better to stop it.

But under the new pastor--with the "church musician" described above--this last Pentecost was another sad example;

In such a target rich environment, may I be charitable and assume that the pastor had to figure out which crazy mess to tackle first, and that improvements are underway - if not always evident?

Dad29,

Last parting shot on this idea. Perhaps a new pastor would appreciate you (or someone else, if not you) who knows how things should be done, as reassurance that he's doing the right thing? Even those who know what to do like to be able to say, "and I'm appointing (Dad29) to implement this policy." and know that it will be implemented by the laity, well.

The pastor has made it clear that HE is the liturgist for the parish.

He has every right to say this, and to exercise his authority towards that end, but I have seen this abused in many ways: YMMV, but based on that statement above, I think he will be making decisions to benefit himself primarily.