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Has anyone had any physical problems with their ears in regards to hearing/matching pitch and intervals?

I'm having somewhat of trouble matching pitch, its really spotty some days I can sit down and nail pitches dead on like no1s business, and hear intervals and other days I can't even tell enuf if im matching ht enote im trying to sing.

I know some of this is from not singing and not doing choir, but I know i've always had comments made about my ears by doctors about having very hard wax compared to what most people have, and I am wondering if this is possibly the cause of my ear troubles..

anyone have similiar experiences?

Look into a possibilty of allergies . I have suffered with ear problems all my life . I recently found out that milk can cause an allegic reaction in some people and cause fluids and ear wax to build up in the canals of the ear . Both in front of and behind the ear drum. I used to be a big milk drinker but have cut way back to drinking milk only a couple of times a week . I can tell the difference when I have a glass or two .My hearing is affected for a day or two afterwards. It is not only milk but other food can do it too . You may want to do a web search on food allergies to get more info.

I go to the ear, nose, and throat doctor about twice a year to have wax buildup removed. It usually gets so bad that one ear or the other clogs up completely. Luckily, my ENT doc is a violinist friend of mine and doesn't charge me. He usually pulls out a chunk as large as a pencil eraser.

The doc says that I have small ear canals. He also says that increased brain activity causes more wax build-up. Perhaps I should start watching TV and I'll go to the doctor less.

Are you taking any prescription drugs? Some can play hob with your hearing. I finally figured out that my hypertension meds were messing with my hearing. (My own physician didn't believe me until I could document it). He prescribed different meds and my hearing's back to its old tin ear self.

When I get a head cold and my ears stop up, I have a similar problem to yours, although it doesn't get as bad. However I can tell a difference in my ability to perceive pitch.

I'd get on a de-waxing program, preferably one that doesn't involve A&W root beer.

The dairy connection is valid too....many people react to dairy. If you're really hooked on dairy, you could try goat milk, which is my favorite. I've never understood people's "YUCK!" reaction to the idea of goat milk...goats are, AFAIK, cleaner and smarter than cows. Goat milk has a molecular structure much closer to human milk, and is produced without the hormones that are commonly in cow milk. Feminizing hormones (in all cow products, unless they are hormone-free, from what I have read) + human male = ??. I am particularly amused by commercials that insinuate that eating beef is masculine.

MA

MellowSmokeMan wrote:...He also says that increased brain activity causes more wax build-up. ..

[ Yer kiddin', right?]

No, he really says that. Besides from being a reputable otolaryngologist, he is also a concert violinist, and studies the ear and hearing from a musician's perspective. I didn't think he was serious at first, but he assures me that "thinking hard" causes excess wax build-up.

I have had chronic ear problems for most of my life and in fact got an ear tube put in last year at the young age of 43 . For me it's been a variety of problems: infections, sinus and allergy issues, a structural problem, ruptured eardrums (ouch!) and lastly, onset of mild Meniere's Disease. Fortunately hearing loss didn't start until last year and the first noticable signs were muffled sounds caused by reduced hearing of certain frequencies. It was intermittent and first, then steady, and improved again to hardly noticable.

The only way to find out if there is something going on is to see an ENT specialist. Typically they have an audiologist in the office to perform hearing tests. If you suspect a physical problem it's good to get in to get a baseline on your hearing and to be examined as some problems are easily treated. One ear tube improved my situation tremendously: I wish I'd have had it done years ago.

MellowSmokeMan wrote:... I didn't think he was serious at first, but he assures me that "thinking hard" causes excess wax buid-up.

So maybe "waxing eloquent" isn't just a figure of speech ...

Mellowsmokeman wrote:
[/quote]He also says that increased brain activity causes more wax build up...
I don't have a problem with that. I would believe that in a heart beat.
I am allergic to dairy,too but my problem is that I spent 20 years with a 100 watt Fender guitar amp boresighted on the back of my head. The amp had two legs that would lean it back 45 degrees and I wanted to know what I was doing to my audience.
However electronic tuners are so good these days, I am O.K. as long as I have one. I bought a Korg stomp box with built-in silent tuning. I like that. I don't have to listen to me tuning and my audience doesn't have to listen to me tuning. I am looking for a clip-on tuner for my tuba and trumpet.
I have trouble hearing E and A but I can fret a string up to the one next to it and get it close enough for government work

My uncle, a family practitioner in small town Nebraska for longer than I've been alive, said that he noticed a couple things regarding ears and infection rates...

He said that the people who had ear problems almost always were the same ones who said that they cleaned their ears religiously and tried to take extra care with them.

Conversely, the people who didn't bathe so thoroughly (this is farm & ranch country, remember) almost always had good, healthy ears.

The idea is that the ear wax itself is a cleaning agent, and its production -- and subsequent ejection -- provides a renewed canal surface. Digging at it with Q-Tips, for example, just pushes it farther in, and flushing out every last bit removes the protection it would offer. I'm sure that earplugs don't help at all, either.

I never clean or put anything in my ears but still have the problem. My Doc does say that one should never put anything in their ear smaller than their own thumb.

Could try what my sister does. Every once in a while she'll fill up the bathtub deep enough to lay back and submerge her head. She'll turn her head to the side, let any air bubbles out of her ear, and do the same to the other. Then, she'll stay there for a while with her face above water and her ears submerged, rinsing out excess wax without getting rid of it all.

She's got a master's in biology & plant chemistry, and I'm pretty sure she's consulted my uncle about it, so I trust that it's got some merit.

Having your ear canal completely filled with water gives a really unique sound, too.

I've fought ear problems almost all of my life, but I think that playing tuba helped my hearing. I know that my hearing loss was around 50% before I started band, and it improved radically over the next few years. One doctor attributed the improvement to using a high-air-volume instrument, because it helped keep a proper balance of pressure in my middle ear.

I've seen several references that say that heavy use of ibuprofen can cause ringing in the ears and distortion of perception of pitch.

Fluid in the middle ear can cause distortion of pitch and timbre. Usually it comes from infections, but music can be a problem. Listening through headphones turned up too loud can cause it. Being a bass player, being too close to a loud bass amp can cause the same thing; for rock, blues, or big-room gigs even with a big band, I have to use earplugs or my ears stop up.

Middle ear infections can also spread to the inner ear and cause the nerves and hair cells in the cochlea to behave unpredictably; they can fire on other pitches than the ones that nature designed them to respond to.

Listening to too much out-of-tune playing can ruin your sense of pitch. Middle school music teachers take note.

And of course, if your ears are made of tin . . .