Peter Harzem wrote: >I apologize for this longish explanation, but it may be helpful since >it is hard to think of anything more important for a musician than >hearing. of course, all with you here.. however, as you have noted, nobody really spends his life wearing headphones and those who do it on a professional basis for hours every day are not likely to use sound sources where (possibly) problematic ranges of frequencies are actually cut off. if you supply your ears with even the standard 20-20kHz you give it more than the avarage +30 old person can still hear. also: the example of calusses is quite misleading: this is not atrophy due to not using but growth due to overusing your hands. the nerve ends below are not dead, just somewhat shielded of. when I stop playing guitar all the feeling comes back to my finger tips after a week. >Use of earphones for listening to music for long periods .. >will over longish periods result in general decline of hearing well, that's not an explanation but a claim, without any proof or, imo credibilty. assuming, of course, that moderate volumes are used!!! and disregarding the biological fact that living over longish periods will result in a general decline of hearing. btw, the original qusetion was about possibly losing the ability of 3-D ie spatial hearing. maybe it gets 'switched of' when hearing normal (ie non 'kunstkopf'-recodings) over headphones for some time; but this is a basic function that I trust will snap back like color vision in the morning So: I do think that both dangers, loss of 3d-hearing due to headphones and of high- and low-end frequencies due to compressed formats are indeed ridiculous. BUT: headphones have a strong tendency to make one 'pump up' the volume and there is indeed a very real danger. an average 60 year old person is likely to have better hearing today than disco-going youngsters or kids who (ab)use their headphones.. oh, and the three smilies are my signature, not a comment (from a verse by R. Hunter: Cats on the rooftop, dogs in a pile, nothing left to do but..) ps: I use AKG K400 for comfort and total 'dryness'/neutrality of sound. the sound of my sennheiser hd580 is also very nice, but my ears are too big after 1/2 hour or so.. :):):) peace, Thomas mailto:[log in to unmask]