Protect Your Hearing!

October 23rd, 2005 Print Tip E-mail Tip

I said PROTECT YOUR HEARING! We all like to crank it up and move some air once in a while. Unfortunately, the sentiment isn't exactly shared by our ears. Lovers of music can get it from both sides---when they're playing music themselves and when they're attending a concert. I've walked off into the night after my fair share of concerts with the feeling that someone rammed a sock in my ear.. Once when I photographed Rush at Massey Hall in Toronto, my ears were still protesting the next day. A friend of mine developed tinnitus from a single Doobie Brothers concert. Eventually you get the idea that you had better protect your hearing, because even though Beethoven may have written the 9th Symphony when he was totally deaf, most of us need some aural feedback. Besides, music is what you love to do, and I'm sure, like B.B. King, you're going to want to play it when you're 80.

Many famous guitarists have some degree of disabling and painful tinnitus (hearing loss that creates constant ringing, hissing, etc. in the ear). Just a partial, and vastly incomplete, list includes Eric Clapton, Pete Townshend, Jeff Beck, Eric Johnson, Neil Young, James Hetfield, Ted Nugent, Rik Emmett, The Edge, Al Di Meola, Mick Ronson---you get the picture.

Some of us might feel only geeks wear plugs and that you can develop a tolerance for loud sound anyway---well, you can't. And I'd rather be thought a geek and have my hearing in ten years than constantly have to ask people to speak louder, let alone diminish my enjoyment of music. There are many good musician's earplugs and in-ear monitors available today that, when used correctly, can help save your hearing. The good plugs attenuate the frequencies evenly for a more natural sound. Your ears are critical assets---protect them.

Please keep your iPod or similar device at a reasonable volume level. Over time if it's played maxed out, the net effect on your hearing is pretty much the same as standing in front of a cranked Marshall stack.

There's lots of information on the web, but a very good place to start would be www.hearnet.com (hearing preservation with the musician in mind).