There was a time when I could hear. I could sit in my normal spot in the high school auditorium and know that one daughter was playing her clarinet well or that another had so completely perfected not actually playing her violin, down to the bowing and fingering, that she might as well have played it. Then the movie “Drum Line” came out and every school need one of their own. Fine, out on the field. Not so fine in an auditorium, where the audio is perfected to get it out to the cheap seats, where I sat. If I have some warning just how loud something can be I can prepare for it, but that CRASH surprised me and deafened my left ear for weeks. Years later it’s “just” tinnitus and a constant hiss.
So thanks, inspirational movie and a high school band it inspired. :rolleyes:
I feel ya, bro. I had my hearing damaged by Hank Williams, Jr, of all people, in 1987. I later found out that he’s known for being ridiculously loud, but I really wasn’t expecting it at the time. Now twenty-some years later I have to watch tv with the closed captioning, and I can’t understand speech without wearing my glasses…so I can read lips.
How long does it take to injure your hearing? There were Rock and Roll bars in the old days ,that when I went in and it was too loud ,i left. Was I there long enough to do damage?
Wah wah wah. I was in a drum line, before the movie, and we played as loud as possible and it was awesome. Every one of us flunked our school mandated hearing tests, but it was worth it because we had a shitload of fun. And we played every day in a fucking closet for 6 years; I can still hear pretty well ( a lot of background noise makes it difficult, but that’s about it), so I call bull shit on you hothouse flowers who say one fucking performance made you deaf.
Not to mention that older ears are less resistant to noise damage than younger ears.
My husband sustained hearing loss from exposure to shrieking children in marble-halled museums in DC during Memorial Day week. I have noticed the effects of this on a near daily basis since this happened a couple years ago; his hearing is obviously worse and he finds it very difficult to hear clearly in situations where he was fine before.
It’s “fun*,” as a parent, to say, “So, you didn’t play a single note tonight, did you? And the church choirmaster expects you to play at a funeral the day after tomorrow?”
Forget drumline. The regular high school brass band is too effin loud. I hated pep rallies, much less actual games. When people would pester me to go to homecoming, I’d say only if you stick mutes in all the tubas and trombones.
And if it was a pep rally for the 4-H Club, then they could be cattle mutes!
My understanding is that if your ears are ringing, you’ve done permanent damage. My husband and I each have a pair of high fidelity ear plugs that we use when we go to concerts, and they work great - you still hear the concert, but it takes the edge off the loudness.
ETA: Though I admit, in retrospect, the marching band always did play too loud, not at all focusing on the quality of the music. It was really frustrating because we had a damn good symphonic band. But somehow aesthetics went out the window as soon as we were in marching formation.
I wear those 32-db reducing earplugs every time I go to the movies, at every theatre chain. I never miss a single word of dialogue. This suggests that either a substantial portion of the public is hard of hearing, or is trying to be.
I long ago concluded that some people like loud noises, and like miss elizabeth, are perfectly willing to cause permanent irreversible damage to their bodies and the bodies of those around them. Loud music is like any other antisocial behaviour: if I’m having fun, why should I consider the effects on other people?
What exactly are you suggesting here? That rock bands play softly and quietly and that marching bands only have one snare drum per band? Or what?
Yes, some forms of entertainment are very, very loud. If you want to enjoy these forms of entertainment without hearing damage, you probably need to bring ear protection of some sort.
I have some sympathy for the OP, but seriously, a marching band indoors? Gonna be loud. I’m not sure why this is so surprising.
There is middle ground, you know. I’m not suggesting that rock bands play “softly and quietly.” I am suggesting that if the form of entertainment is so loud that one performance will damage your hearing, then that’s a problem. Why can’t it be loud enough to hear the music clearly and to give you that sense of being surrounded by the sound, but not so loud that your ears are ringing for the next 24 hours?
And since marching bands weren’t developed to play indoors, yes, I am suggesting they be modified for the indoor environment. When you go to see a play outdoors, the actors are usually amplified to take the changed environment into account; why wouldn’t the same thing apply in reverse?
Yeah, really. Isn’t there a lot of territory between “softly and quietly” and “will cause permanent damage”?
I use to play in rock bands, small-potatoes stuff–local bars, that kind of thing. But standing in front of amplifiers for a lot of years affected my hearing. And it always seems to be a constant battle to get everybody to dial it down. The bias is to creep toward 11. We’d yell at rehearsal, everyone would agree that the sound was better and no real “power” was lost at lower decibel levels. But when we played, it ALWAYS creeped louder and louder. I did it, too, even without realizing it. You want to hear yourself, and when you raise the volume, you create a Spinal Tap domino effect, because everyone else wants to hear himself too.
I don’t go to many concerts, but when I do, I wear earplugs. I lose some of the sound that way. I wish I could hear every nuance in the mix, but I lose some with earplugs. I’m sure that is to some extent because I’ve already damaged my hearing. Whatever the reason, I have no more hearing to spare. I absolutely HATE being taken surprise by a performance that I had no expectation would be earsplitting (happened to me most recently at a casino performance). If it’s not practical to leave, I literally stick my fingers in my ears.
Anyway, I don’t think hoping for something south of “permanent hearing damage” makes one a hothouse flower.
something that may help are shooter’s earplugs, they are an open channel that has a piston that closes under a high pressure sound, they allow hearing quiet sounds and will muffle loud sounds like a gun shot. small and fit in the ear canal and cost a few dollars can be found in sports stores or sporting departments. they look like the ones linked to by Cat Whisperer.
The thing was, campers, I wasn’t expecting to be deafened that night. It was supposed to be a simple high school band concert with them on-stage and not some moron (he was a drummer; I assume “moron” is given ;)) eight feet away. If I knew what could happen I’d’ve brought earplugs since I always have some.
And what the hell are they making drum heads out of these days? When they were real skin they were more mellow. Now its like dynamite in sheet form.
ETA: And it happened with a single beat. It hurt so much I covered my ears, but the damage was done.
(former trombone-playing band geek)