Celebrities & Musicians with Tinnitus:
Credit: website
Neil Young - (loud music) main reason for his "acoustic" music during early 90's
Barbra Streisand - "Streisand has ascribed her volatile temperament to the tinnitus from which she has suffered since she was seven." source: news.independent.co.uk
Pete Townshend - "I have severe hearing damage. It's manifested itself as tinnitus, ringing in the ears at frequencies that I play guitar. It hurts, it's painful, and it's frustrating."
Townshend is completely deaf in one ear from an
explosion when Keith Moon blew up his drum set
live on stage in the early 1960's and loud amps. He has
tinnitus, resulting partly from the band's live gigs but mainly the
deafening volume in which he and Entwistle used to listen to playbacks
over the studio "cans." There are reports saying that he is unable even to hear his phone ring.
The Sun newspaper reported Townshend said his hearing got worse after the band's
recent US tour. Quote from Pete:
"The recent return to touring and to me playing electric guitar - albeit
more quietly than in the 1970s - led to further deterioration of my hearing,"
the 57-year-old said. "My right ear, which encounters my own edgy guitar
and the machine gun strokes of the drums, has suffered badly. Luckily for me, I still have my left ear, which seems to be less @#%$ up. When I've worked solo in the past five years I've not used drums. This has meant I could play more quietly I think. With The Who, there is of course no way to play the old songs without drums.
I've no idea what I can do about this. I am unable to perform with in-ear monitors. In fact, they increase the often
unbearable tinnitus I suffer after shows." source from
Sky News
John Entwhistle - According to Who scholar Andy Neill, Entwhistle was pretty deaf, and tended to rely on lip-reading. He didn't have tinnitus but still played bass at his usual "everything on 11" volume.
William Shatner - He acquired tinnitus from a loud stage/prop explosion on the set of an episode of StarTrek (during the mid 1960's). He says it contributed to the breakup of his second marriage, and even made him consider suicide.
source from
Carleton University
Leonard Nimoy - stage/prop explosion on set of StarTrek (during mid 1960's)
David Letterman - T in one ear, has had T a long time: Dave mentioned to William Shatner that he too had ringing in his ears, and has had it for a long time. On a different show episode, Letterman talked about
how well he did on a hearing test. He asked Paul about his and Paul said, "I'm deaf as a doornail"
Paul Schaffer - "He's got that?! I've got that!" on Billy Bob Thornton's character with Tinnitus in 'BANDITS'
Bill Clinton? - (wears hearing aid) T probably?
Tony Randall
Engelbert Humperdinck
Rosalynn Carter
Steve Martin - musician (banjo player), actor, comedian. He acquired Tinnitus while filming a pistol-shooting scene in "¡Three Amigos!" in 1986.
"You just get used to it."
Leslie Nielsen - actor in such movie spoofs as "Police Squad!", "Airplane!", "The Naked Gun" series
Mark O. Hatfield
Ronald Reagan
Jean-Jacques Rousseau - Influential eighteenth century political philosopher. From
"Confessions" (1780) "...a great noise started up in my ears, a noise that was triple or rather quadruple, compounded of a low and muffled humming, a softer murmuring as though of running water, a piercing whistle...This internal noise was so loud that it robbed me of the keen ear I had previously enjoyed and made me, not completely deaf, but hard of hearing...
in spite of the throbbing in my arteries and the humming in my ears, which since that time, some thirty years ago now, have never left me for a moment...The noise was irksome, but it caused me no suffering: it was not accompanied by any chronic
affliction, apart from insomnia at night..." P. 222, Oxford World's Classics paperback edition, Oxford University Press, 2000
Jean-Francois Champollion - (1790-1832) Champollion was a French Egyptologist and
scholar who is acknowledged as the father of modern Egyptology. He is best known for
deciphering the Egyptian Hieroglyphs on the Rosetta Stone. His deciphering of hieroglyphics laid the foundations for modern Egyptology and
Egyptian archaeology. In the book "The Keys to Egypt", it describes how Champollion
drove himself to complete an encyclopedia of his work. "Depressed and feeling more and
more unwell, Champollion now wrote to his brother about the damage done by the strain
of work: 'My poor head hurts, my tinnitus, the humming and buzzing noises, has worsened
and leaves me neither day nor night. I have frequent spasms and am incapable of
occupying myself seriously for more than a quarter hour...' "
Richard Thomas
Brian Wilson? T? - deaf in one ear from when his father hit him in the head with a board at an early age
Dave Pirner - (Soul Asylum) (loud music)
Bob Mould - (alternative music icon)
Neve Campbell - loud dance clubs
Jeff Beck - band Yardbirds (loud music), From an interview with rock guitarist Jeff Beck:
"Yes, it's in my left ear. It's excruciating... I mean, it's the worst
thing 'cause it's not... It never... It does go away - it's not true to say
that it doesn't but, uhh... It doesn't... The doctors say it won't... It isn't
actually going away - you've just gotta suppress... They try to come to terms
with what it actually... Why some people fear it - that's the psychology behind it.
They know it's there but why is it such a horrible sound? Well, you can say why is a
guy scratching at a window with his nails such a horrible sound - I couldn't put up
with that! This is worse!"
As Jeff told MTV - June 1993, He was asked to do a special guest spot with Guns 'n' Roses
but had to cancel out. Jeff was going to play "Locomotive" with the band, but during the
rehearsals, he used Slash's amp rig which aggravated his tinnitus forcing him to drop out of the gig.
Douglas J Noble - musician, guitar instructor, and music journalist out of Edinburgh, Scotland. From a Jeff Beck
interview: "I've got tinnitus in my left ear...I mean it's permanent! Like just now..."
Mike Patton - T? lead singer for Faith No More; Wrote the Mr. Bungle's tune "Slowly Growing Deaf".
Burt Reynolds
Sting - (loud music)
Liberty Divito - (Billy Joel's drummer) (loud music)
Eric Clapton - (loud amplifiers)
Eric Johnson - has developed T (loud music/amps); source from Guitar Player Magazine interview: "I'd run two Marshall stacks onstage and crank the monitors. I started using Fender Deluxe Reverb amps and 50-watt Marshalls around '97, after I
started having some problems with tinnitus. It was my own doing -- being irresponsible and thinking
I was invincible...Yes, though it has been better lately. Take care and wear plugs. Don't think it
can't happen to you. When I had a speaker reconed at the been here for years reconing shop in Austin
the owner said, "I've reconed speakers for every guitarist in Austin for years and as far as I
know there aren't any rock 'n roll lead guitarists here who don't have tinnitus to some degree or
another. Many have it so bad they have trouble sleeping."
James Hetfield - Metallica rhythm guitar and uses Sonic II Ear plugs
Lars Ulrich - drummer for Metallica
Vanilla Fudge - Tim Bogert (bassist): "Tinnitus, big time. That’s the price you pay for having a darn good time. Nothing’s free!"
Radiohead - lead singer
Motorhead - Lemmy Kilminster (thrash-punk-metal pioneers): "We just like it loud, you know?"
Kevin Shields - guitarist/singer for My Bloody Valentine: "I did the damage to my ears listening to mixes in headphones at very loud levels without giving my ears time to recover."
Blinda Butcher - bassist/singer for My Bloody Valentine: "I had a punctured ear drum which fortunately they were able to put right but for a while I couldn't hear out of one ear and it was very depressing. On stage we all wear hearing protection and encourage anyone who sees us regularly to do the same."
George Martin? - retired from music due to hearing loss
George Harrison? - had hearing damage from loud music
Thomas Edison
Graham Cole - UK actor and singer, suffers tinnitus and hearing loss
Sylvester Stallone
Ted Nugent - Amboy Dukes guitarist: "My left ear is pretty much whacked. But I can still hear really good in my right ear. Early on, I would stick shell casings, which I always had handy, in my ear, to protect my right ear because that was the one that was facing the amp the most."
Rick Emmett - Triumph guitarist, source from Guitar Player Magazine
Bono - U2 lead singer, he even sings about it in his lyrics.
Bono derived his name from a hearing aid store in his hometown of Dublin, Ireland
which had a sign that read 'Bonavox Hearing Aids'.
The Edge - U2 guitar player
Ben Bossi - Saxophone player for Romeo Void. From a VH1 interview: His ears had
started ringing and he was losing his hearing when the band
was in it's heyday. He quit playing the sax after the band broke up and hasn't
played since.
Peter Jennings
Jerry Stiller - Frank Costanza on Seinfeld
Lorence Henderson
Stephanie Beacham - actress, She is completely deaf in one ear, partially in her other, and is associated with the
Tinnitus Society of Great Britain.
Husker Du/Sugar - frontman
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Martin Luther
Joan of Arc
Oscar Wilde
Sheikh Hasina Wajed - T? former prime minister of Bangladesh, has gone deaf in her right ear after suffering an injury in a grenade attack.
Source from:
deafweekly.com
Phil Collins - sources: newspapers/website. From Sky News: He will have to severely cut back on live performances "thanks to the buzzing in his ears."
"Phil Collins recently declared an end to his concert touring because of the hearing loss he has suffered. The 51 year-old former Genesis drummer and vocalist
announced that he will perform live only occasionally to avoid further hearing loss on
his hearing damaged left ear." source from
hear-it.org
Cher - actress/singer, Cheryl Sarkisian LaPiere
Morgan Fairchild - T? Actress; She was born a preemie who developed scarlet fever. She has so many kidney and ear infections as a child that she admits she is "partially deaf."
Cheryl Tiegs - Super model
Blixa Bargeld - (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds / Einstuerzende Neubauten)
Ozzy Ozborne
Huey Lewis
Tony Franklin
Alan Shepard - (T and Meniere's Disease)
Ira Flatow - National Public Radio - Host, Talk of the Nation: Science Friday
"Some interesting and hopeful news for people, like myself, millions of us, who have a constant ringing in one or both of our ears...
Researchers have figured out where in the brain that ringing- called tinnitus - originates."
Click on the below link to view and listen to Ira Flatow's program on Tinnitus with guests: Dr. Alan Lockwood (Professor of Neurology, Nuclear Medicine, and Communicative Disorders and Sciences,
State University of New York at Buffalo, Research Physician, Veterans Administration Hospital, Buffalo, New York)
and Dr. Richard Salvi (Professor of Communicative Disorders and Sciences, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York)
Science Friday: Tinnitus
Don Imus
Vincent Van Gogh - maybe why he cut off his ear
Francisco de Goya (1746-1828) - Spanish artist that had tinnitus and hearing loss from a severe illness.
Ludwig Van Beethoven - Famously deaf, Beethoven was also a famous tinnitus sufferer. The great composer was driven mad by "rushing and roaring sounds" in his head.
Robert Schumann - composer
Bedrich Smetana - it was a high E, and it was in his string quartet "From My Life."
Charles Darwin - who kept records of its daily amplitude and frequency
Clive Barker - T? disturbing story "Dread"
Mick Fleetwood - T? Fleetwood Mac drummer; "The world's worst is when you find yourself going like Mother Hubbard and cupping your hand behind your ear. I was a
major glutton for volume: 'Gotta feel it, gotta hear it.' Sooner or later you're going to pay the reaper."
source:
Rolling Stone Magazine
Stewart Copeland - hearing loss but no T yet
Keanu Reeves - plays bass in the band Dogstar
Ed Rush & Optical - (aka Ben Settle and Matt Quinn) Ed Rush the famous drum/bass DJ and producer and his
producing partner, Optical, both aquired tinnitus from working the the studio.
Larry King said he has tinnitus on his left ear. He also said his is very low and it dosn't bother him
Steve Tarkanish - former drummer now music agent promoter. "Tinnitus from loud music and cymbals."
Dave Swarbrick - fiddle player Fairport Convention mammoth onstage amplification (ironic for a 'folk rock' band).
Charles Arthur - guitar player
Charlie Haden - jazz bassist, Charlie Haden to Charles Arthur (Q&A),
"Over the years I have learned to adjust my life to this
problem and accepted these ear problems as part of my being. In other words,
I tell myself that I've been this way since I was born. This helps me to
reduce the stress and frustration of this condition. I wear earplugs when I
play that cut out 32 db's, as well as using plexiglass baffles. You are
seeing the right person in Dr. Jack Vernon. Many musicians have this problem.
I take it you know about "Tinnitus Today" and "H.E.A.R." from Dr. Vernon.
Good luck and keep positive, Charlie Haden"
Kathy Peck - bass player/singer-songwriter: "My life had really changed when I experienced the loss of my hearing and Tinnitus damage after the Contractions opened up for Duran Duran."
H.E.A.R. -
"As a former bass player and singer for the San Francisco rock band The Contractions, Kathy had suffered hearing damage while playing a set at the Oakland Coliseum in l984. The repeated exposure to excessive noise caused a ringing sensation in her ears called tinnitus, as well as decreasing her ability to hear."
Michael Tomlinson - musician/singer-songwriter: After an ear infection, he temporarily lost 90% of his hearing for a few weeks, but still has Tinnitus in one ear. Source from: E-mail correspondence
Al Di Meola - musician/guitarist: "I do. That's why i don't play electric anymore."
John Densmore - drummer for The Doors,
Ray Manzarek says that things are looking grim for Densmore, in
terms of his future as a musician: "Tinnitus, man, you can't...You
know, there's nothing you can do about it. It doesn't get better. It
can only get worse--that's the hell of that thing. You'd say, 'Well,
you know, when it's better, you're gonna play, man.' Well, it doesn't
get better. The nature of that problem is that it can only get worse."
Jimmy Savile - "It doesn't bother me in the slightest," he told Michael
Church. "It reminds me of all the girls I've known, and all the discos.
I'm very happily ensconced with this friend inside my head." Source from:
news.independent.co.uk
Michael Church - "I acquired my own tinnitus in the stupidest possible way: on
the rifle range at Catterick army camp, while training as an officer cadet. St Albans
School in the late Fifties was a grotesquely spartan place, where ear-defenders were
unheard of (my fellow victim Stephen Hawking improvised earplugs from blotting paper,
and the doctor had to dig them out). After a noisy afternoon with a Bren firing 12
inches from my left ear, I returned home deafened, and though my hearing eventually
returned (minus the high frequencies), I was left with a loud hiss. (Yes, I should have
sued both the school and the MoD, but 16-year-olds don't have time for such niceties.)"
Source from:
news.independent.co.uk
Francis Rossi - lead singer and guitarist for the band Status Quo.
Mick Ronson - David Bowie's guitarist, had tinnitus in the ear that was
closest to his speaker column.
Hansi Kursch - lead singer and bass player for the band Blind Guardian. Kursch actually lost all hearing on one
side, and then suffered tinnitus in the same ear. source from
DynamiteMetal.com
Jarmo Miettinen - Rhythm guitar & vocals for the band Status Quiz
Todd Rundgren - Musician
Trent Reznor - Nine Inch Nails
James Destri - keyboardist who wrote "Fan Mail" by Blondie on the album Plastic Letters
Roger Miller - "Mission of Burma...Its career cut short by guitarist Roger Miller’s mounting tinnitus...
Miller’s never shaken his condition, but now wears firingrange headphones so that Burma’s full
sonic experience--high decibel levels are a key component in the band’s music--can be
unleashed upon the crowd." Source from:
www.avguide.com
Richard Pleasance - guitarist for Boom Crash Opera, took time off in 1990 from touring with this band due to tinnitus. Source from:
www.vh1.com
Danny Elfman - Oingo Boingo, film scores/composer. Touring took a major toll on his hearing and he still suffers from tinnitus. "The last five or six years I was in the band, my instincts were telling me I was doing myself a lot of harm - and I was right. I really should have gotten out sooner than I did, and I'm incredibly regretful that I didn't because I'm paying the price for it now."
Source from:
OCRegister
Steve Lukather - guitarist/song writer for Toto, developed tinnitus sometime in the 1980's. "Yes I have tinnitus,
what a drag. I wear earplugs now 'cause of it. I found that it was all the years
wearing headphones that did me in more than live playing. I used to have the real
expensive plugs, but I found some 2 dollar ones that work just as good and you
don't feel bad losing them, hahaha. My hearing is damaged though. I always have
to say "WHAT???", hahaha. Be careful guys, this could happen to you!"
Source from:
www.stevelukather.net
Andy Partridge - guitarist/song writer and former front man of XTC. "Right now, I'm taking
twin noise generators out of my ears. They’re hearing aids in reverse. They are retraining my brain
to not hear tinnitus over the next 18 months. I've been wearing them for the last month or so...The first
time I was suicidal was when I found I had tinnitus."
Source from:
wired.com
James McBride - author and jazz tenor saxophonist.
That familiar ring, in his ears: McBride is so attuned to life from a musical standpoint that "I can tell you the pitches of the tinnitus in my ears: G-sharp in one, D-sharp in the other."
Source from:
.chicagotribune.com
Garrison Keillor - author and host of "A Prairie Home Companion." Here is an excerpt from a column he wrote for the
Chicago Tribune on June 20, 2007: "Some people consider cicadas pests but I found them comforting. I suffer from tinnitus, the ringing in the ears, and the cicadas chitter in the same frequency range as my inner ear and mask the ringing very nicely. I stood in the park where they were whirring around and I felt relief. Medicine has no remedy for tinnitus. I've tried acupuncture and that doesn't work either. My only alternative, I guess, is to wander the planet in search of cicadas.
Tinnitus can drive you nuts, especially if you spend a lot of time in quiet rooms, but luckily I am able to ignore it, thanks to my innate talent for obliviousness."
Source from:
chicagotribune.com
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