Ear Plugs

[ojc123]

It's not recent though, is it? Thin Lizzy at Leith Town Hall in the mid 70's left me with ears ringing for three days and seriously worried that I had permanent ear damage. The quality of sound then wasn't so good so it possibly felt louder. It was so loud it was painful. I ended up listening in the Foyer along with quite a few others.

 

The recent thing is that people are starting to think about it.

 

I agree with Josh 95-98 dB is acceptable if the sound is good. Lots of bass makes it sound louder and gives the experience without the pain.

[csg]

the points regarding pushing the bass level making it sound louder "without the pain" are interesting - according to the audiologist that makes my custom moulds, the Bass part of the frequency spectrum is in fact the most damaging part of the frequency range, containing as it does the most amplitude, and therefore the most potential to damage the middle ear.

 

Loud bass is not painful as the ear is relatively insensitive to this range, which makes the potential for hearing damage even more likely.

[dbuckley]

It's not recent though, is it? Thin Lizzy at Leith Town Hall in the mid 70's left me with ears ringing for three days and seriously worried that I had permanent ear damage. The quality of sound then wasn't so good so it possibly felt louder. It was so loud it was painful.

 

That's odd. I saw Lizzy several times back in the day (Liverpool Stadium!) and recall they were not excessively loud. Deep Purple, on the other hand...

 

My surprise this century was Brian Wilson. Given he is really old and most of his concert attendees (including me) are at least "quite" old, I'd have thought he'd be quite laid back, volume wise. How wrong I was.

[paulears]

The trouble is I suspect that volume levels are not what we really hear. We've all been to, or worked at events where the sound level seems really loud, but actually isn't, and we've been to the local pub where it hurts, plus of course the horrible disco at the wedding that sounds ok until they turn it up, and 200W per channel through a piezo speaker kills you!

 

Is it level or content that does the damage?

 

My own view is also that smaller bands are more dangerous because they just stick vocals through the PA - leaving everyone to fight their own corner. When I've played occasionally in these kind of bands you turn up so you can hear yourself and play the gig. Next day back at home you plug in the amp and discover how loud it was set to! Didn't seem that loud at the gig, but must have been?

 

I can remember Slade being VERY loud, yet their PA was three WEM 100W PA amps connected to 3 4 x 12" columns each side! As for the glitter band with two drummers!

[i_hate_fisicks]

Giving out earplugs at gigs seems to be madness. You go to all the effort of making the show sound good, and then give everyone plugs to ruin it. Crazy.

 

Just turn it down!

[Alec]

As for the glitter band with two drummers!

 

They were loud enough the other week with just one!!!

[paulears]

We're looking at amplified music, but how do you quieten a symphony orchestra going full tilt in the fff passages?

 

The notion of turning down makes sense if the volume is really OTT, but you can't please everyone. In my 1200 seater venue, row A are pretty close to the noise source, while row HH are a fair way away - the shape of the venue makes any notion of using delays impractical, because the height drops to only 9 feet at the back. It's also very wide so speakers on the side walls are out too (for a number of reasons). Volume at the front is too loud, volume at the back is often insufficient. Visiting bands mixing from the back set what appears to be modest level, but from experience, we know at the front they will be lifting toupees! Some bands like to work quite modestly, level wise - and the number of quiet stages is increasing rapidly. What is very sad is when the holdback on stage is at a level that means you don't need FOH - this is really common. 60's and 70's rockers, who are still going seem the worst. They won't use in-ears and their damaged hearing means their pair of wedges fill the entire venue. These are the ones who want controlling.

[GridGirl]

We're looking at amplified music, but how do you quieten a symphony orchestra going full tilt in the fff passages?

 

When you figure it out, please let me know! I do agree with the school of thought that turning it down a bit is better than handing out earplugs - however, having said that, everyone's sensitivity to noise is different, and so what might be comfortable for one person is still ear-bashingly loud for another. With that in mind, having plugs at a gig is a good idea.

[pete10uk]

I wish I'd taken plugs last night.

I know that as a sound engineer I'm meant to make it sound good but when you have what sounds like a chipmunk in destress going in its dam hard to make it sound any different comIng out. That and the fact the range went from nowt to full blown sqweel as loud as you can, my poor compressor and ears were working over time.

 

Needles to say I exercised my right to turn the volume down to 1

[J Pearce]

To follow on the orchestra comment I frequently play in an orchestra and a brass band as well as regularly attending rock gigs.

Sitting the wrong side of 8 french horns in the finale to Mahlers 1st combined with my assault on a pair of timpani was louder than any gig I'd want to stay at, and the plugs went in before that moment.

Exposure wise orchestras are probably a little safer because of the greater dynamic range, but that varies by composer and some of Beethoven's later works and some of Berlioz's works probably don't come below 80dB very often, and could easily hit 100+dB if performed with the advised number of performers.

 

Reallistically I'm not sure this is something that can be solved by legislation. I think education and allowing people to make their own decision is a better way forward. Gigs will soon get quieter if the gig going public decide they won't risk their hearing.

[pete10uk]

 

Reallistically I'm not sure this is something that can be solved by legislation. I think education and allowing people to make their own decision is a better way forward.

 

Here Here.

[GridGirl]

To follow on the orchestra comment I frequently play in an orchestra and a brass band as well as regularly attending rock gigs.

Sitting the wrong side of 8 french horns in the finale to Mahlers 1st combined with my assault on a pair of timpani was louder than any gig I'd want to stay at, and the plugs went in before that moment.

Exposure wise orchestras are probably a little safer because of the greater dynamic range, but that varies by composer and some of Beethoven's later works and some of Berlioz's works probably don't come below 80dB very often, and could easily hit 100+dB if performed with the advised number of performers.

 

Try the big moments in Turandot or Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet as well...we have major noise problems in our orchestra pit because 2/3 of it is under the stage, so the sound bounces around before it can escape - no fun when you have four horns, four trumpets, three trombones and a tuba blowing the snot out of it. Every production we do is monitored for noise, then I feed the results into a very complex Excel spreadsheet which does all sorts of clever calculations and references the roster, so I can make it spit out a graph of noise exposure over the season for any player. We very commonly have to mark the parts down, particularly in the brass; last time we did Swan Lake we had to have sixteen trumpet players because their noise levels were so high they could only LEGALLY do two shows a week. We've done some modifications to the pit since then which means the trumpets don't have to sit in front of the 'bones any more, which hopefully means when it rolls around in December that we'll only need two teams of trumpet players not four...

 

Interestingly, we're about to start on a trial of some active hearing protection devices - electronic earplugs first; they have two settings, 9dB and 15dB and on the lower setting actually amplify soft sounds - so if you've got them in, the conductor stops and then talks to you, you can hear them without removing the plugs. The second device I know less about but basically it's plugs which have a tiny mic and speaker in them - the mic sits right at the entrance to the ear canal - this means it picks up what you would normally hear. You have a beltpack which processes the signal and feeds it to the speakers within the plugs - and then of course you can control the volume, but you're still hearing what you expect to hear. If either of the devices are good, it's going to revolutionise the way our pit works....

[Solstace]

@Gridgirl - Sounds like quite the spreadsheet! I'm encouraged to see at least one venue taking noise exposures seriously. Out of interest, do you guys have the same 80/85dB_LAeq,8h action levels in Australia that we (arguably) have in the UK? You got a link or brand name for those earplugs, perchance?

 

Generally, I think it's good that we are becoming more aware of the risks involved with noise exposure, even if the early stages of our measurement, monitoring and implementing solutions ends up seeming draconian or over-reactive. Venues actively making earplugs available can clearly be a good thing, but only afterappropriate measures are taken to reduce exposure in other ways. I'm still learning about the legislative aspects of this, so my views are developing almost by the day as more information trickles through my rather crammed brain...

[GridGirl]

@Gridgirl - Sounds like quite the spreadsheet! I'm encouraged to see at least one venue taking noise exposures seriously. Out of interest, do you guys have the same 80/85dB_LAeq,8h action levels in Australia that we (arguably) have in the UK? You got a link or brand name for those earplugs, perchance?

 

Yeah, we are required to keep weekly exposure under 85dBa - theoretically daily exposure should be under that but sometimes (Turandot, for instance) you just can't. It's a mammoth spreadsheet which someone far cleverer than I built, I just take last season's one each new season and change the shows and the noise readings because if I touch anything else I'll break it and never be able to fix it!

 

We have to take noise exposure seriously - our pit is so problematic that if we don't, we'll have major problems very quickly. I haven't got the earplug info on me right now (I'm at home) but I'll dig it up when I get to work tomorrow.

[alistermorton]

My late lamented mate Peter Tinniswood had a character in his books called Uncle Staveley. Having been a gunner during the war his sole contribution to conversation was; "I heard that! Pardon?"

 

I didn't know you cared?

 

It's not recent though, is it? Thin Lizzy at Leith Town Hall in the mid 70's left me with ears ringing for three days and seriously worried that I had permanent ear damage. The quality of sound then wasn't so good so it possibly felt louder. It was so loud it was painful. I ended up listening in the Foyer along with quite a few others.

 

I remember in about 1980 seeing the Banshees at the music machine and not being able to hear properly for two days afterwards. I seriously doubt that would be allowed to happen these days.

 

I remember there were buckets of earplugs available at the Brighton Dome when Manic Street Preachers played on the "plague lovers" tour. I don't recall it seeming that loud at the time, but afterwards it took about two hours or more to stop feeling disconnected rom reality, so maybe it was louder than it seemed.