Hearing loss due to working in an orchestra

Almost all of the percussion instruments we play in the percussion section of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, as well as any symphony orchestra, can be loud enough to permanently damage your hearing. So when I go to work everyday, I wear a specially made ear plug just in my right ear, because all the boys in the percussion section sit to my right, so all the loudest most painful noises come at me from that side. So I always wear one earplug even in performances. My own instruments can create 124 decibels, now a jet engine makes 140 decibels, so that gives you some idea of how loud I can play. So almost all the people that sit near a loud instrument like a percussion section, we all take precautions with special ear plugs, or special chairs that have baffling behind your head, that helps to absorb the worst of the sound waves from the loud instruments, so it’s a real concern, and it’s a legitimate part of health and safety in our workplace, and we have provisions built into our contract that allow us a certain obligation to be protected, and we have mandatory hearing tests every year, so that if we do suffer any hearing loss, we can show from year to year that it has been perhaps because of the workplace. And so all of us in the NZSO take hearing protection very seriously indeed.