ABOUT THE ARTIST:
Steven D. Rauch, MD, is Professor in the Liberal Arts Department at Berklee College of Music, where he teaches Science of Health and Wellness. He is also Professor and Vice Chair for Clinical Research in the Department of Otolaryngology at Harvard Medical School. He is an Otology Division member and Vestibular Division Chief in the Otolaryngology Department at Massachusetts Eye and Ear (MEE) and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston. Dr. Rauch is a member of the Research Advisory Board of the American Otological Society and past member of both the Advisory Council and the Board of Scientific Councilors of the NIH National Institute of Deafness and other Communication Disorders (NIDCD). He serves on numerous committees and editorial boards in the United States and internationally. Dr. Rauch is a founding member of the Berklee Music + Health Institute and a passionate champion for hearing health of performing artists.
ABOUT THE WORKSHOP: Hearing Health and Hearing Loss
No high school or college athlete on the football or soccer or softball team would be allowed on the field without a pre-season physical exam. So why do we enroll and train musicians and other performers without screening and monitoring their hearing? Performing artists must meet high practice and performance demands during their training and careers. New discoveries about noise injury raise serious concerns about the safety of the training and performance environment of these young artists. The aim of this presentation is (1) to present up-to-date information on normal hearing and on acoustic trauma and its newly discovered corollary, “hidden hearing loss”, the acute and progressive loss of nerve connections to auditory hair cells that follows loud noise exposure, (2) to describe an illustrative pilot hearing screening and conservation program for the music conservatory, and (3) to discuss changes to the music production and engineering environment to promote hearing conservation.