The sound engineer tells you: how to protect your hearing.

　　For musicians and sound workers, the most precious thing is the ears. Making music requires a long time to deal with speakers and headphones. Protecting hearing has become a top priority. This article will talk about how musicians can develop good listening habits.

　　Just like you can't get a taster to taste hot oil, you can't stick a sharp needle into the eardrum of a mixer's ear. But I've come across some mixers who often use very high monitor levels, which can be fatal to our professional requirements, like sticking a needle into their eardrum. Unlike inserting a needle into the eardrum, the hearing damage caused by high monitoring levels is often not noticeable, whether it is immediate or a long period of time.

　　In simple medical terms, after a few years, we may lose our ability to perceive high frequency sounds, and the unfortunate among them may lose the ability to actually hear them. In some cases, high monitor levels can cause permanent damage to the eardrum, or even cause an earpuff. Many audio engineers have had several monitor-level-related surprises in their careers, and most have been lucky enough to recover. However, the phenomenon of tinnitus with a continuous 7kHz pure tone in the brain is not very pleasant.

　　Many musicians, especially those engaged in live sound reinforcement and performances, have experienced hearing discomfort to varying degrees. Chang Shilei was unable to sleep for a long time due to tinnitus. There are also musicians and teachers whose hearing has dropped sharply in one ear due to the loud pressure on the stage for a long time. Therefore, musicians should pay more attention to listening habits than ordinary listeners.

　　Before turning on the monitor speakers, confirm the monitor volume on the sound card, and then turn the monitor volume to a low level.

　　Before wearing the monitor headphones, play a piece of audio to listen to the sound from the headphones, and then wear it after confirming that the sound is not too loud.

　　Being able to develop the above two principles can prevent such problems from happening to the greatest extent possible. Many times, we cannot predict how loud the audio will be played next, whether the music software and equipment will fail, whether the monitoring volume on the sound card will be reset to 0dB due to other circumstances, and so on.

　　It's easy to turn up the low volume, but it's too late to turn the volume down when you hear a "boom". Burning the speakers is a trivial matter compared to the damage to your hearing.

　　Listening volume:

　　When using monitor speakers (www.gae-pro.com), monitor volume should be lower than standard monitor sound pressure. The standard monitoring sound pressure in the mixing studio is 85 dB SPL. This loudness is more used for final inspection works. In actual work, in order to reduce auditory fatigue, it will probably work between 70-75 dB. The sound pressure of a child screaming at a distance of one meter is about 85 dB, and the sound pressure of 85 dB does not sound very noisy. Many people usually listen to music and increase the volume unconsciously. Attention is easily surpassed.

　　The sound pressure can be measured with a sound pressure meter or a similar APP on the iPhone. After testing, you will probably know where to adjust the monitor volume on your sound card, and the output volume is about 85 dB. Remember This position, usually do not let the output volume exceed this position.

　　When using headphones to listen to music, because everyone has different habits for volume, just like some people have a salty taste and some people have a light taste, there seems to be no unified standard for headphones. But in principle, I think, in the case of clear hearing, use as low a volume as possible to monitor. Loud volume is bound to cause fatigue and hearing damage. In particular, try not to use headphones in a noisy environment, because if you want to hear clearly in a noisy environment, you must turn up the volume.

　　In addition, musicians who have been in the shed for a long time have very sensitive ears. They should not go to places that are too noisy, and stay away from bear children who may scream at any time. A recording engineer in a recording studio usually carries earplugs that can reduce the volume with him when he goes to listen to the scene.

　　Continuous listening time and rest:

　　Working with monitor speakers, every hour of continuous listening, take at least a five-minute break to get up and move, not only for the sake of the ears, but also for the health of the body. When you are in the shed, you may have to work continuously for 8-12 hours a day, and it is necessary to combine work and rest. Continuous monitoring for a long time is more likely to cause auditory fatigue, affecting the accuracy of sound judgment, thereby reducing efficiency.

　　Monitor headphones are more prone to fatigue than monitor speakers. Not only the fatigue of normal listening, but also the weight of the headphones themselves, the pressure of the headphone springs and other factors. I personally think that the fatigue point of listening to music with headphones is about one album, that is, not a single album. more than 50 minutes. If you use headphones for more than 4 hours a day, you should try to use the speakers as much as possible.

　　Last week, there was a joke on Zhihu. An audiophile said that when he listened to XX headphones, he would get tired after listening for a long time. After reading the XX forum, he said that upgrading the power cord would improve. He asked me if it was true. You will be tired, you are too poisoned. Headphones are not suitable for long-term wear, no matter how good the headphones are.

　　How to detect auditory fatigue? When you find that you can't hear clearly at the current loudness, and you subconsciously want to turn up the volume, it may mean that you need a break. If there is no end to raising the volume all the way up, it will exceed the standard monitor loudness and cause more damage, which is obviously wrong. I even ask myself to turn the volume down instead of up when I can't hear clearly, and stop and rest for a while if I still can't hear clearly.

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