Musicians and music enthusiasts

Music is your passion, and your hearing is your livelihood! As a musician, live performer, or voice coach, excellent hearing is your greatest asset. It enables you to continue your career and excel in your field.

While one in five musicians experience hearing issues, there is good news: proactive measures, such as regular hearing check-ups, can help detect potential hearing problems early. Instead of waiting for issues to arise, protecting your hearing optimally can advance your career.

Professional guidance can also be invaluable. Hearing specialists help you recognize and prevent potential hearing problems before they impact your life and career. By taking preventive measures, you can confidently continue doing what you love most – making music, performing, and coaching others.

What are the early signs of hearing damage? Here are a few to note:

• Difficulty having conversations in a noisy environment, such as tuning your instrument in an orchestra.
• Constant whistling or ringing sounds in the ear, known as tinnitus, making it harder to hear music optimally and distinguish individual instruments in a piece of music.
• Reduced ability to hear high-pitched or soft sounds, affecting the perception of optimal acoustics and music.
• Increasing difficulty with telephone conversations, leading to using the speaker function more frequently to better hear your conversation partner.

Selecting the right hearing protection for individuals in the music industry is more complex than in other sectors. For musicians, the joy of playing music should not be lost.

For this reason, the attenuation (damping) must be precisely adjusted to prevent hearing damage while preserving the music experience. Moreover, this attenuation must be evenly distributed across all frequencies. If not, the sound can be distorted, leading to a loss of dynamics. Flat attenuation filters provide the solution in this regard.

Equally important is regularly checking the proper functioning of your hearing protector. By “proper functioning,” we mean checking the attenuation as well as the leak-tightness. The latter means that there is no leakage around the hearing protection. This can occur if the hearing protector is not custom-fitted for your ear or does not seal optimally.

This is one of the drawbacks of disposable earplugs: they are universal and not custom-made for your ear. Furthermore, your ears continuously change over the years, for example in shape and especially in size. Therefore, certain custom-molded earplugs may fit well one year but may not seal optimally a year later. Most custom-molded earplugs are also not suitable for the music industry, as they often attenuate the sounds that musicians need to hear.

By making custom-molded earplugs for music, HearingCoach ensures that you never walk around with a false sense of security. Your ears are 100% protected!

Many bands and orchestras use wireless monitor systems. However, professional guidance is necessary here too. In-Ear Monitor Systems can deliver sound individually and with perfect sound quality at a safe volume level.

However, the custom-made “earpieces” must also be perfectly leak-tight. Our preventive audiologists can provide you with appropriate advice on the various top products suitable for In-Ear Monitor Systems in our assortment. This way, you can be assured of the best quality and perform your profession optimally.

It’s not surprising that one in five musicians suffers from hearing damage. During the pursuit of your profession, you often work in loud sound volumes for extended periods. Even famous musicians frequently struggle with hearing problems.

For example, Eric Clapton (guitarist and singer) has experienced temporary deafness. Pete Townsend (guitarist of The Who) cannot tolerate any loud sound to this day, as it causes too much pain in his ears.

Jeff Beck (guitarist) also suffers from tinnitus: “It’s like the hissing of a shower. Innocuous in itself, but my subconscious perceives it as a threat.”

Chris Martin (Coldplay) warns fellow musicians: “Taking care of your ears is unfortunately something you only think about when there’s a real problem. I wish I had thought about it earlier.” Chris Martin has tinnitus due to permanent hearing damage.

“Get yourself checked if you notice any hearing loss. It’s really terrible to have hearing damage; I know from personal experience,” says Whoopi Goldberg (actress and singer).

Don’t be one of those five musicians with hearing problems. Don’t let hearing damage have a chance with you, take care of your ears, and thus your career!