When I ran across the tutorial excerpted below on ProSoundWeb, I thought my bass playing brethren might also be interested:
A final point that needs covered on the nature of human hearing is what I call "threshold shift." This is the activation of the muscles in the middle ear as a built in compressor to protect our hearing from continuous loud sounds. If you have ever been to a loud concert than started out unbearable, and then became "glassy" and ok volume wise, and then noticed that the world was REALLY quiet after the show, you have experienced threshold shift.
One thing that, unfortunately, often accompanies the "really quiet" phase is ringing in the ears. Ringing in the ears comes from leaking calcium ducts in the ears, ducts that have been damaged by excessive vibration of the inner ear hairs. When these ducts leak, the brain falsely perceives that the tone range of that particular hair is happening continuously. Ringing in the ears is a clear indication that you have caused acute trauma to your inner ear! Whether or not these trauma repair themselves is a matter of debate, but the damage has been done at least temporarily.
Threshold shift typically takes a matter of minutes to set in. For me it is about 5-10minutes, and typically releases between fifteen and thirty minutes after the exposure. The louder the sound, and the longer the exposure, I find increases the release time.
Threshold shift is the death of good mixing for me. My ability to judge mix balance, and quickly pick up problems frequencies greatly diminishes. Today I threshold shift about 97dBA slow. If I am asked to mix above this level I typically have to alternate songs with my earplugs in, and then out, just to keep my ears out of threshold shift. I suspect that i threshold shift at a lower level than most people, as I am relatively young, and have taken very good care of my ears. Threshold shift is big motivating factor for me to try to mix at moderate levels.
I also suspect that threshold shift is one of the biggest problems between musicians and monitor engineers. A brief soundcheck, short enough to make the monitors seem loud and clear, and not long enough to cause threshold shift, goes well for band an monitor engineer. However, once the show is going, and the band has been subjected to high levels for a more extended period, threshold shift sets in, the sound from the wedges goes to mush in the muso's ears, and all they know to do is ask for more level! This is the crux of so many soundcheck vs. show moments, that I feel this must be a major part of the underlying cause for the problems the musicians experience during the show.
Here's the link:
http://forums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/topic,99329.msg928241.html#msg928241
A final point that needs covered on the nature of human hearing is what I call "threshold shift." This is the activation of the muscles in the middle ear as a built in compressor to protect our hearing from continuous loud sounds. If you have ever been to a loud concert than started out unbearable, and then became "glassy" and ok volume wise, and then noticed that the world was REALLY quiet after the show, you have experienced threshold shift.
One thing that, unfortunately, often accompanies the "really quiet" phase is ringing in the ears. Ringing in the ears comes from leaking calcium ducts in the ears, ducts that have been damaged by excessive vibration of the inner ear hairs. When these ducts leak, the brain falsely perceives that the tone range of that particular hair is happening continuously. Ringing in the ears is a clear indication that you have caused acute trauma to your inner ear! Whether or not these trauma repair themselves is a matter of debate, but the damage has been done at least temporarily.
Threshold shift typically takes a matter of minutes to set in. For me it is about 5-10minutes, and typically releases between fifteen and thirty minutes after the exposure. The louder the sound, and the longer the exposure, I find increases the release time.
Threshold shift is the death of good mixing for me. My ability to judge mix balance, and quickly pick up problems frequencies greatly diminishes. Today I threshold shift about 97dBA slow. If I am asked to mix above this level I typically have to alternate songs with my earplugs in, and then out, just to keep my ears out of threshold shift. I suspect that i threshold shift at a lower level than most people, as I am relatively young, and have taken very good care of my ears. Threshold shift is big motivating factor for me to try to mix at moderate levels.
I also suspect that threshold shift is one of the biggest problems between musicians and monitor engineers. A brief soundcheck, short enough to make the monitors seem loud and clear, and not long enough to cause threshold shift, goes well for band an monitor engineer. However, once the show is going, and the band has been subjected to high levels for a more extended period, threshold shift sets in, the sound from the wedges goes to mush in the muso's ears, and all they know to do is ask for more level! This is the crux of so many soundcheck vs. show moments, that I feel this must be a major part of the underlying cause for the problems the musicians experience during the show.
Here's the link:
http://forums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/topic,99329.msg928241.html#msg928241
I refuse to play volume wars. I have learned to play when I can't hear myself. I don't like it, but I can do it.
