CONTEMPORARY CHRISTIAN ACAPPELLA MUSIC GROUP SINGS OUT "FREE INDEED" ON ITS BAG END SYSTEM

"Free Indeed," a contemporary christian music group based in Bentonville, Ark., has acquired a BAG END loudspeaker system to help them deliver their message. Jon Jouvenaux, leader of "Free Indeed," calls the group "family." It's comprised of Jon and his wife, Julie; Todd Thompson and his wife, June; and long-time friend Darin Martin. Julie and June, by the way, are twin sisters. They are backed up by a crew of nearly 30 people.

Jouvenaux describes Free Indeed, which sings more than 80 dates a year and has 14 albums to its credit, as "a ministry that provides powerful messages which strive to bring people closer to God through music. We use music to move people." And that's the reason sound quality is so important to the group.

"We're an a cappella group," Jouvenaux said. "We don't have any instruments, we have some people who back us up with vocal percussion, so we require the same range that a band does, but we have to have total clarity because there are no guitars or drums or basses or a trumpet section, nothing to cover up what we do, so it has to be a true representation of what our voices do or it doesn't work." "Free Indeed" travels with a full complement of lighting engineers, video engineers and sound engineers, sound equipment and a full video backdrop.

"For years - for years - we've been looking for something that would sound like a big system but would fit under the bus," Jouvenaux said. "When we were at the Springdale (Ark.) Acoustics sound seminar and sang on the BAG END system, it just rocked the house and there wasn't anything to it sizeqise - so we bought it that day. It rocked our world." Jouvenaux estimated the BAG END system will pay for itself within about 20 trips just in fuel savings alone.

"We were in the process of purchasing a 24-foot box truck to haul equipment until that seminar. We figure we have saved the purchase price of the truck, plus insurance, fuel and repairs."

Jouvenaux added, "We're not trying to just entertain people, we're trying to make an impact on their soul, and music does that better than any other tool we're know. One of the reasons we brought the BAG END system was not just because it sounds good but because it feels good - the stuff that happens in the low frequencies moves people. The low frequencies are so crisp and so clear and reproduce what you put in them so well, we use that as a tool to move people where they live - inside."

No one in the group has taken formal music lessons. "June, Julie and I grew up together in North Little Rock, Jouvenaux said. "We just started singing on double dates in the car instead of turning the radio on."

Jon and the girls started out copying music from popular groups of the day such as Manhattan Transfer and some things from the 30s and 40s, such as the Andrew Sisters. Friends heard them and coaxed them into singing at school banquets and parties.

Todd Thompson joined the group sort of by accident. June met Todd when she and Julie were attending Harding University in Searcy, Ark. Julie and Jon decided to get married in 1985, and wanted to sing their own music at their wedding. They asked June to help out and June asked Todd, who would later become her husband, to join them to sing tenor. From that came requests for them to sing at other people's weddings.

But things didn't get really serious until 1987.

"We were asked to sing at a youth rally so we had to learn harmony to religious music," Jouvenaux recalled. "A guy at the rally came up to us and said he wanted a tape of our music and we said we didn't have one and didn't known how to go about it. He went around and asked people at the rally if they would give $20 for a copy of our first album. At the end of the rally he handed us $800 and said, `Go make a tape, I want a copy of this.'

"We went down to a studio and recorded and mixed our whole first album in one day. You understand we didn't have a clue how to do it. We didn't know you could punch in and punch out. We sang a whole song and got it as close as we could and called it done," he said.

"From that point on, God has taken us down a path that is just unreal," Jouvenaux concluded.

Free Indeed has its own web site: http://jonj@freeindeed.org and can be contacted via its web site.

BAG END Loudspeaker Systems has been manufacturing professional quality loudspeaker systems and components for more than two decades, building an enviable reputation among performing artists, recording studios, post production facilities and sound reinforcement companies.

For more information on BAG END Products, contact BAG END at http://www.bagend.com or call BAG END at (847) 382-4550.

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