Hearing loss

Here's a test of a piece of piano music. Simple - so you can listen hard. One is the track as recorded and the other is the track with everything above 11K, rolled off. I then renamed them and I can't tell which is which. Clearly there are no jangly benches of keys or expensive cymbals or stuff like that - just normal music. It does make me wonder about my plan to switch at some point from 48K (which this is, 32 bit floating point for info) to 96K. I really don't think that for my music there's any point. It's not a quiz - and all I can say is one of the tracks I know has less up top because the screen tells my eyes, not my ears but without me looking, I just cannot tell with my ears. I suppose I'm just wondering if anything useful exists up there - because adding stuff above 10K seems to be just a tone choice. Rich mentioned the line flyback noise - I started in radio and TV and re-remembered that sound, and how annoying it was.
version 1
version 2

With so many people now having evidential hearing loss - either spot frequencies, general slope off or the nasty rise in tinitus, maybe it makes the quest for HF a bit pointless?

The two tracks above, to me are identical - clearly technically they're not, but are those two top octaves that important? I'm not certain any longer.
 
Mickster said:
2 years ago I had an air hose explode very near my head. Picture filling a tire with air. I was completely deaf for about a minute I think. My ears rang for a day after. I did get to an ENT about a week later and my right ear has a broad drop off after 6k.....still good mids....and weaker bass and sub. My left ear has slightly better upper range.....poorer mids and better bass and sub hearing. So...in a way.....my hearing weaknesses and strengths balance out...sort of. The ENT gave me a printout of my results. Keeping in mind that the test is done with headphones on I used a VST effect in Reaper to adjust EQ to compensate for my test results. It really wasn't difficult....and to be honest....the effect / result has been great. I think my mixes are helped a lot.

Think about it. Unless you have perfect hearing in both ears and most people don't.......you have some frequency that needs to be compensated for in volume in at least one ear.....unless you have some range of absolute deafness. So.....use a good set of cans.....and use your hearing test results....and adjust as needed. Yes....I know that cans also have their frequency response variations so making absolute black and white adjustments may not be as effective as you think. Try to look at a frequency chart for the headphones before you begin and use that in your adjustments. BTW.....old guys like me might like the Sony 7506's because they're so upper frequency dominant. Old age mostly deteriorates upper frequencies. I use a set of Sennheiser HD600's and more recently the AKG K371's as my adjusted cans.

2 cents worth of rambling....and maybe not making 100% sense.

Mick
Click to expand...
:-D Yes Mick, it makes sense.
 
Mickster said:
2 years ago I had an air hose explode very near my head. Picture filling a tire with air. I was completely deaf for about a minute I think. My ears rang for a day after. I did get to an ENT about a week later and my right ear has a broad drop off after 6k.....still good mids....and weaker bass and sub. My left ear has slightly better upper range.....poorer mids and better bass and sub hearing. So...in a way.....my hearing weaknesses and strengths balance out...sort of. The ENT gave me a printout of my results. Keeping in mind that the test is done with headphones on I used a VST effect in Reaper to adjust EQ to compensate for my test results. It really wasn't difficult....and to be honest....the effect / result has been great. I think my mixes are helped a lot.

Think about it. Unless you have perfect hearing in both ears and most people don't.......you have some frequency that needs to be compensated for in volume in at least one ear.....unless you have some range of absolute deafness. So.....use a good set of cans.....and use your hearing test results....and adjust as needed. Yes....I know that cans also have their frequency response variations so making absolute black and white adjustments may not be as effective as you think. Try to look at a frequency chart for the headphones before you begin and use that in your adjustments. BTW.....old guys like me might like the Sony 7506's because they're so upper frequency dominant. Old age mostly deteriorates upper frequencies. I use a set of Sennheiser HD600's and more recently the AKG K371's as my adjusted cans.

2 cents worth of rambling....and maybe not making 100% sense.

Mick
Click to expand...
Yes Mick, it does make sense.
 
TalismanRich said:
I'm in the same boat. By the time it gets to 10 or 11K, everything is pretty much gone. Left ear is better than the right, and the ringing comes and goes with the sinus issues. It sucks getting older.

I once was hiring a chemist for color matching/formulating. One candidate was really qualified, had a good personality, seemed to be ambitious. At the end of the interview, I said "wait.. one quick test." Pulled out the Dvorine color blindness test and asked "what number do you see?" The guy looked for a while and asked "where?"

He didn't get the job.
Click to expand...
Laughing face for the interview story, not you losing some hearing.
 
That Soundgym thing isn't serious is it? They're plaguing me now with requests to go back and do more tests, but it's not ear tests, it's ear training and I'm not sure what is's really about.
 
I gave the two files a listen, and my guess is that the first one has the top lopped off. Version 2 might have a little bit on certain notes (around 1:45-1:50), but it's basically a toss up. The problem I have is that piano probably doesn't have a lot above the 10K except for some of the highest notes. As I said earlier, listening to cymbals, is usually the most obvious place for me. Maybe adding in triangles and xylophone.
 
Yep - jangly stuff would make the top empty bit busier, but lucky for me - they don't feature too often in my stuff - although I have to admit that when I do modern stuff with drums I tend to add a bit of boost to the top end. Now I'm wondering if it really needs it, or am I compensating for my hearing? Can of worms opened now!
 
Would you think the system I suggested could ever replace normal olfactory hearing? Sound beaming.

There is one test where they fire the sound beam on the person's skull in front(forehead). They make him hear things on different sides.

Like allow deaf people to hear the symphony?
 
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rob aylestone said:
Here's a test of a piece of piano music. Simple - so you can listen hard. One is the track as recorded and the other is the track with everything above 11K, rolled off. I then renamed them and I can't tell which is which. Clearly there are no jangly benches of keys or expensive cymbals or stuff like that - just normal music. It does make me wonder about my plan to switch at some point from 48K (which this is, 32 bit floating point for info) to 96K. I really don't think that for my music there's any point. It's not a quiz - and all I can say is one of the tracks I know has less up top because the screen tells my eyes, not my ears but without me looking, I just cannot tell with my ears. I suppose I'm just wondering if anything useful exists up there - because adding stuff above 10K seems to be just a tone choice. Rich mentioned the line flyback noise - I started in radio and TV and re-remembered that sound, and how annoying it was.
version 1
version 2

With so many people now having evidential hearing loss - either spot frequencies, general slope off or the nasty rise in tinitus, maybe it makes the quest for HF a bit pointless?

The two tracks above, to me are identical - clearly technically they're not, but are those two top octaves that important? I'm not certain any longer.
Click to expand...
I can't honestly say I can tell the difference between those two.
 
I've listened to some files form other sites, including sweeps etc. They seem to confirm that I hear nothing above 11 or 12 kHz. I also have a notch at around 3.5kHz and another one in one ear around 7kHz. A while back I was eq some eazy drummer cymbals and adding a shelving eq around 12kHz and nothing was happening. I assumed it was because the cymbal samples used had nothing in that area, but it looks like it was my hearing.

Hearing does drop off as you get older. In the UK, when they are having problems with teenagers hanging around outside of stores they play a high pitch tone which annoys teenagers but adults can't hear it. I even heard a police officer say that some of the teenagers in his patch used the tome as a ring tone so the teacher wouldn't hear if their phone rang in class. :LOL:
 
That's pretty clever thinking! Outside my house is a circle of grass and some trees and we get groups of lads who congregate sometimes and the folk who live here hate it. As I have some rather potent PA kit, it's surprising what you can do with a line array box or two in a bedroom with an open window. 14K I cannot hear at all, but a YouTube tone and a rather hefty power alphas a remarkable effect. 50m away, they stop dead, and gradually head in my direction but once they are maybe 10-15m away they seem to lose the localisation and cannot tell where it's coming from. The tree seems to be the source and they spend ages looking for the loudspeakers. However, it's painful and they always go away. The ones at the supermarkets are about 3W these are somewhat more - each box has 3 HF units each one rated about a 100W or so. It also makes dogs bark too. I'd also be lying if I said it wasn't good fun. It works best by gradually turning it up but watching them is really amusing.
 
Maybe I could rig up a portable system. A recording of tone going up slowly then down and wander through a public space, videoing from a distance so you could analyse it afterwards to see who starts looking around and who doesn’t?
 
I could not hear a difference on the two piano recordings.... Audio is a crazy thing and just because we can't "hear" it doesn't mean it isn't there AND effecting / affecting us. My neighbors have two German shepherds and a mutt that are the most annoying pieces of shit when they start their barking bullshit. Try as I might to get to know them and get them to obey when I say no or stop...they just bark away and I keep talking to them trying to get them to stop...they stop..I try to walk away ..they start again...The game continues. I will sit there and keep at the Alpha sometimes for 3 or 4 minutes until I can get her to sit. Then she stops ..we stare at each other I tell her "good girl" start to walk away and off she goes again like she wants to eat me for dinner...damn annoying shit......I downloaded an app called itrainer that allows me to play different frequencies...using that app I cut off at @ 10,800 Hz as far as my ability to hear...I guess for a 67 year old rock n roller with a shit ton of live concerts under my belt and working in construction for 20 years using jack hammers, grinders and saws I'm doing pretty good...I usually use @ 1700 on the Alpha dog to get her to pay attention..I just hear the click that lets me know it is emitting the noise.

I have posted about this dude I met after a open mic in LA a few years back name Frank Simes...He's a bad ass guitarist whos main gig is the music director for The WHO ...He has a side gig where he expounds upon the power of vibrations where he gets into the science and physics ...He invited me and I went to one of his shows...The Big Strum Theory...crazy shit about the effect of audio harmonic waves...

 
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