Abstract
Professional classical musicians develop their craft over many years so that they can perform consistently at the highest level. As their craft develops, their hearing inevitably deteriorates chiefly, but not solely, through the ageing process and exposure to high levels of sound over time. Yet musicians do continue performing. As their sense of hearing deteriorates their skill of listening develops; exposure to loud sounds is not always a predictor of hearing state, nor are hearing-test results linked to ability to earn a living in music.
I conducted extended semi-structured interviews with 13 musicians who tell of their exposure to noise inside and outside the workplace, and their changing relationship with their ears. I carried out an extensive review of relevant medical-science and policy literature, and explored the frameworks, particularly oral history, that have shaped my analysis of the stories musicians tell about this complex, often controversial and constantly evolving subject.
This project has two sources of inspiration. Beethoven writes, in his Heiligenstadt Testament (1802), of his despair, social isolation and frustration with doctors, but also his determination to keep going as a musician. Walter Benjamin in his essay The Storyteller (1936) describes storytelling as an “artisan form of communication”.
Musicians are consummate artisans, highly specialised and collaborative, working in an art form characterised by tradition and community. I explored what it means to have a musician’s ear over a long career by listening to musicians’ stories about noise, hearing, and listening to words and music. I found echoes of Beethoven’s resilience in the face of intractable physical challenges. I found that noise is less tolerable if employers are not addressing it, and that audiometry results are of less interest to musicians than the challenges of listening to speech in background noise – cocktail parties – as audiometry has a focus on speech rather than expert listening to music.