Hearing aid a help?

[Peter Friedman]

After reading this thread for a while I decided to add my 2 cents.

Just over a year ago I went to Costco and got Jabra Enhance pro Hearing Aids. They seem to be working fine, but there is one problem. They get cloggled with earwax frequently. 

The positive part is that I can take them in to Costco and get them cleaned while I wait, and there is no charge. Nonetheless, it is frustrating that it seems as if they become clogged every couple of months which requires me to have to drive to Costco and have them cleaned out.

[JSngry]

Earwax is real!

[Gheorghe]

15 hours ago, mikeweil said:

You should seriously consider trying a hearing aid. Mine mostly just boost up the high frequencies because that is where my hearing is impaired. I have a gig coming up (my first in many years) accompanying a pianist/singer/songwriter, just playing a snare drum with brushes in half of the pieces, which I simply would not hear properly without hearing aids. Your remarks about how you perceive the drum sounds tells of a serious bias in that respect.

Then....your hearing must be much worse than mine, because if I play a gig I hear everything the drummer plays. Dusan Novakov is a great and powerful drummer, as is Mario Gonzi with whom I also had played some concerts two years ago....(you find  ´em both on wikipedia). 
If I listen to a record, okay if it´s a live record I feel better, because those always have better drum sound. 
If it´s a studio record, I´d listen to it with headphones. 
 

Until now I didn´t have the impression that my weak hearing impaired my active makin´ music. 
I have difficulties if someone talks and there is noise from "Pressluftbohrer" or something like that, or if there is many voices, but I am not in the situation where I HAVE to hear anything that´s spoken...

Last time we wrote each other you told me you got no time to listen to my album since you doin 18th century stuff, but now, would you please listen to it, it has a dream team of drums - percussion, and your opinion of the music would count for me.

[mikeweil]

8 hours ago, Gheorghe said:

Then....your hearing must be much worse than mine, because if I play a gig I hear everything the drummer plays.

I have only 15 % hearing loss in the high frequency range. How much is yours? Did you ever have an examination?

You are hearing what you beleive to be everything. Well, he is a powerful drummer as you say. Does he have any loss or why is he playing loud? Can you play softly and still hear "everything"? The changes come slowly, so you don't notice. Simple tests: Do you understand someone whispering`Do you hear it when you rub your fingers besides your ear? Watcch out and have an ear ewxamination. Playing louder may be not good for your fellow musicians or the audience. 

Records have a drumsound different from live situations, not necessarily a better one. But I agree that drums are almost always too low in the mix in studio recordings.

Edited October 23, 2024 by mikeweil

[Peter Friedman]

I wear my hearing aids when hearing live music, and when out of the home visiting friends or in a restaurant.

At home I only wear my hearing aids when watching TV with my wife in the larger room . In the other smaller room, I often am watching TV alone and wear good quality headphones to watch TV.

When listening to recorded music at home with my very good sound system I prefer to not wear hearing aids as I can set the volume just right for my listening preference. Sometimes early in the morning or late at night when my wife is sleeping I wear headphones listening to music so as to not disturb her. 

[Gheorghe]

15 hours ago, mikeweil said:

I have only 15 % hearing loss in the high frequency range. How much is yours? Did you ever have an examination?

You are hearing what you beleive to be everything. Well, he is a powerful drummer as you say. Does he have any loss or why is he playing loud? Can you play softly and still hear "everything"? The changes come slowly, so you don't notice. Simple tests: Do you understand someone whispering`Do you hear it when you rub your fingers besides your ear? Watcch out and have an ear ewxamination. Playing louder may be not good for your fellow musicians or the audience. 

Records have a drumsound different from live situations, not necessarily a better one. But I agree that drums are almost always too low in the mix in studio recordings.

My hearing was a mess since I was born it seems. When I was about 8 or so, some young doctor (orelist, or how you say for ear doctor ? ) because he wanted to exame highly talented kids (me ! ) who have perfect pitch, and by examinating me he discovered that I have 20% hear loss. 
Then at high school there was an asshole doftor who made that test if I hear whispering which I plainly told him I wouldnt even try it because I never had understood if someone is whisperin. Then he made a lot of "tam tam" din asta and of course I didn´t pay no heed. 

Well at the Army, when I tried to get inapt for military service because I pretended I don´t hear well and had a certificat medical with me I was told I don´t have to worry, the trainers in the Army are yellin´ as hard that even if I´d be completly deaf I might hear it. 

Well, 47 years ago. Sure my hearing didn´t get better and sure I made them tests. 
 

But I never heard that playing louder is not good for fellow musicians or audience. Man, that´s jazz, and it is not "chamber jazz" like ECM music. People who want to hear some hot music, they know it is not a Mozard string quintet or what it is, it is jazz .....

Maybe, independent from Art Blakey whom I admire, but don´t have nothin common with him and he was a genius and I am a little Scheißer...., it seems that I always had thought like him, a bit stubborn, a bit "Wildfang", even before I got to know who he is...... He also didn´t wear hearin aids.

As for people, I like women, but anyway the kind of women I have liked always had some deeper, smokey voices that I can hear well.....you know "femeia fatală” (fatal woman) 😄

[Brad]

The Oticons have what is called a speaker; it’s right before the tip that goes in your ear. You need to change them every ten days or so as they get filled with wax but this doesn’t entail a visit to your audiologist or Costco or wherever and they are quite inexpensive. 

[JSngry]

Blakey wore hearing aids at the end, and was damn near deaf without them 

[Gheorghe]

17 hours ago, JSngry said:

Blakey wore hearing aids at the end, and was damn near deaf without them 

I saw him with a hearing aid in 1980, but not while playing, it was before the gig. 

I have heard, that he didn´t use hearing aids on stage even when he was near deaf, because when you play you perspire a lot and that causes damage to expensive hearing aids. 

Well I understand what Blakey was saying he "heard" from the vibrations on stage. 

If I go to listen to someones concert I always make sure to sit as near to the drummer as possible, and it gives me just a sensation of extreme well-feeling, if I not only hear the drum solos, but feel them in my body.  Thats such a pleasant feeling. 

As @mikeweil said, that bad hearing may impair also certain musical abilities: Sure ! But it depends on the music you play. If I´d have a fiddle player and he goes up into hi notes, well maybe I won´t hear them. If it is more kinda chamber jazz of the more western intellectual manner (maybe ECM stuff) and things maybe without drums done in pianissimo, you won´t be able to do it with bad hearing. But the usual jazz that most people want to hear to groove, like the Jazz-Messengers was, does not need extreme good hearing......

[Brad]

I had my annual hearing test and my hearing worsened to the extent that the audiologist suggested an ochlear ear implant, which since that involves surgery to the head is not something I want to do; I had knee surgery this year and at this point I’ve seen enough doctors to last me awhile. She made adjustments and that seems to work well. 

[jlhoots]

25 minutes ago, Brad said:

I had my annual hearing test and my hearing worsened to the extent that the audiologist suggested an ochlear ear implant, which since that involves surgery to the head is not something I want to do; I had knee surgery this year and at this point I’ve seen enough doctors to last me awhile. She made adjustments and that seems to work well. 

Audiologists seem more aggressive than ENT physicians.

[Brad]

1 hour ago, jlhoots said:

Audiologists seem more aggressive than ENT physicians.

LOL!