Face the music: Classical music students and the sound of performance

Abstract

Since the implementation and enforcement of the European Union Physical Agents Directive (Noise) the Acoustics Group has collaborated with the Royal Academy of Music creating the noise team formed from administrators, scientists, and senior management. Our challenge was to allow these highly talented artists to practice, rehearse, and perform safely during their time at the Royal Academy of Music. This ten year project involved more than 3000 musicians measuring sound exposure of each instrument group and the hearing acuity of every student, as well as hearing surveillance of a sample of graduates. At each occurrence, the students were questioned as to their aural environment. The paper will focus upon the hearing acuity of undergraduates after studying music for a period of four years.