Essay #5 – Hearing

Sound of Silence

 

            As I listen to my favorite music, I catch myself listening to the melody, or music that is playing more than the words or lyrics.  As I change the song I am listening to, I then start to listen to the lyrics more than I do the music that is playing.  This makes me stop and wonder to myself, “why do I listen to the music more in some songs, and the lyrics more in other types of songs?”  This thought process also makes me wonder about my sense of hearing.  I can’t help but to think of what is the sound(s) we hear every day.  The answer that I receive is music.

            I hear music playing every day.  Whether it is at a shopping establishment, or at a restaurant, or just walking on the street as a car passes me; I hear music every day.  I then start to wonder how my life would be if I wasn’t able to hear this music that I take for granted every day.  What if I couldn’t hear anything?  What if I was deaf?

“Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter.”

John Keats

 

            I try to imagine everyday without being able to hear any sound.  The idea of it all just astounds me.  I wondered then, how do deaf people learn music?  I found out that someone who is deaf can “listen” better than someone who has the sense of hearing intact.  Darrow described in his Journal for Music Therapy:

Eight students with severe to profound hearing loss were found to reproduce pitches more accurately when the graphic equalizer of the sound system on which the stimulus pitches were played was adjusted to complement their audio logical response curve, than when a flat frequency adjustment was used.  (Darrow)

            How can there be music for deaf people? How are we to explain the evolution of music from Bach to the Beatles to someone who cannot hear their works?   The first thing that came to my mind was the case of Beethoven. This famous composer began to lose hearing at the age of thirty and even thought of committing suicide. Instead, with the aid of his “inner ear” he composed his well known symphonies. Not a bad topic to demonstrate to students with disabilities about what can be achieved through will power and personal effort.

            Although as I thought about this, I realized that Beethoven could hear at a younger age, and he eventually lost it during time.  I researched how deaf people can understand music.  The interesting thing is that deaf people can understand music just as well as anyone who has the sense of hearing, simply by vibrations.

            Deaf people sense vibration in the part of the brain that other people use for hearing – which helps explain how deaf musicians can sense music, and how deaf people can enjoy concerts and other musical events. “These findings suggest that the experience deaf people have when ‘feeling’ music is similar to the experience other people have when hearing music. The perception of the musical vibrations by the deaf is likely every bit as real as the equivalent sounds, since they are ultimately processed in the same part of the brain,” says Dr. Dean Shibata, assistant professor of radiology at the University of Washington.  (Washin.)

            This fascinated me, because I never thought that someone who is deaf can still feel the music as I do being able to hear.  This made me ask the question of whether or not I would be able to hear the music or would I be able to listen if I was deaf?  In another words, would I be able to feel the same emotion that goes into a love song, or would I just be able to know what the words are, and not have the same emotional feel.  Alice Darrow again made a study proving that deaf people can feel emotion through the music they are listening to.

Although emotional interpretation of music is an individual and variable experience, researchers have found that typical listeners are quite consistent in associating basic or primary emotions such as happiness, sadness, fear, and anger to musical compositions. It has been suggested that an individual with a sensor neural hearing loss or any lesion in auditory preceptors in the brain may have trouble perceiving music emotionally. The purpose of the present study was to investigate whether students with a hearing loss who associate with the deaf culture, assign the same emotions to music as students with regular hearing.  The study resulted in a positive effect in deaf students, as they were able to feel the emotions of the various songs performed during the study. (A.A.Darrow)

            I realized through this short study, that it doesn’t matter if I would be able to hear or not.  The power of music is something that is deeper than our senses.  The power of music shows that even thought I may not be able to “hear” the music; I can still listen to it.  I can still feel the emotion of a song, whether it be by reading the lyrics, or by feeling the actual pulse of a song through my sense of touch. Music is said to be the universal language.  Any culture can understand music, and now I understand that someone who is deaf can understand that music, if not better or more appreciative than I can. With all of this information running through my brain, I stop and ask myself; is music possibly the key to a sixth sense?

 

           

           

 

Works Cited

Darrow, A. A. (1990). The effect of frequency adjustment on the vocal reproduction accuracy of hearing impaired children. The Journal of Music Therapy, 27(1), 24-33.

 

University Of Washington. “Brains Of Deaf People Rewire To “Hear” Music.” ScienceDaily 28 November 2001. 23 March 2009 <http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2001/11/011128035455.htm>.

 

 

Darrow, A.A.. “The Role of Music in Deaf Culture.” Journal of Music Therapy (2006): 33-34.