Hearing Damage and Prolonged Listening at High Levels at Concerts : From the Perspective of a Live-Sound Engineer

This paper will investigate the risk of exposure to high SPL (Sound Pressure Level) from the engineer’s point of view. The goal is to determine if the engineer faces a greater risk than the average concert visitor. The approach is to use measurement equipment during live concerts and analyze the results and compare these to the SPL recommendations in Sweden.The result of the measurements shows that a sound-engineer leaps a greater risk of getting hearing damage than the average concert visitor. Mainly because that the engineer is exposed to harmful SPL at a higher rate, but also due to transient exposure during setup and sound-check. The exposure can be limited by wearing ear-protection at critical points in the work, such as setup, entering the stage and during some times of the concert.Validerat; 20110621 (anonymous