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Nothing is more valuable to a musician than their hearing. If you are a professional musician, it’s important to be proactive about protecting your hearing. Without it, you risk losing the ability to do what you love most. There’s no simpler way to protect your ears than by wearing earplugs specifically designed for musicians.
Without the proper ear protection, musicians are at risk of suffering from hearing loss or tinnitus. Hearing loss results in the partial or total inability to hear. This occurs naturally with aging, but exposure to loud noise accounts for nearly half of all hearing loss cases. On the other hand, tinnitus leaves you hearing a sound when no external sounds are actually occurring. This sound can take many forms, but often it’s described as a ringing sound that varies in pitch. Both hearing loss and tinnitus are significant obstacles for musicians and can be avoided if proper proactive steps are taken – like wearing earplugs.
Many musicians resist wearing earplugs out of fear that wearing them will distort how they hear the music. This fear isn’t unfounded, especially because the wrong earplugs can create that effect. That’s why it’s essential that musicians stay away from generic earplugs and invest in earplugs that are made to fit the needs of musicians. This means that the earplugs won’t distort the music from its true sound. Instead, the best earplugs work in a way that lowers the damaging sound levels.
When shopping for the best earplugs for musicians, comfort is key and so is sound quality. When you wear earplugs, the music should sound just as it would if you weren’t wearing them – only quieter. In order to achieve this, the best earplugs for musicians will have an equal attenuation across all frequencies as to not distort the sound. You’ll know you’ve found the best earplugs for protecting your hearing when they can reduce the noise by about 15 to 30 decibels.
