I know there are Deaf/HoH folks out there who are very musically inclined.
Tate, not so much.
Oh, he enjoys hearing music, but making it? Well, to be fair, he will frequently sing songs of his own creation, but they definitely fall more into the category of "a joyful noise" than actual music.
And I forget, sometimes, to go to the effort to expose him (and his brothers) to music at home, though I love music myself. In fact, because of his hearing loss, I probably play less music around the house than I would have otherwise. Sometimes it's just extra noise that he has to filter out in order to hear what he wants/needs to hear, and other times... well, with three talkative and otherwise noisy boys running at a pretty high volume fairly often, sometimes I just want the quiet. And in the van, with all the road noise, we have to have the music pretty loud for him to hear it at all, which means it's a choice between listening to music OR having a conversation, but not both.
I'm working on it. I'm trying to expand their musical horizons beyond The Beach Boys, Johnny Cash, Chuck Berry, Mark Knopfler, Chet Atkins, and the Chipmunks. I'm getting a wee bit weary of Surfin' Safari.
So the other night I pulled out a CD of Tchaikovsky, cranked up the volume, and we all listened to the 1812 Overture.
Oh my goodness. I've never seen Wyatt so excited by a piece of music. Tate and I stretched out on the floor and I put his hand on the speaker. The music is fairly complex, and I can only assume that he might not be hearing all the interwoven harmonies.
But he heard the cannons. Oh yes, he heard the cannons. Classical music is anything but dull. I mean, hey... any time you can work in artillery, you pretty much have a captive audience at my house.
4 comments:
I love it! We try to keep background noise down at our house, too- which means we don't often have the radio on. My husband, however, is a music NUT and turns on various types of music (he likes weird bands, but also loves classical music) for the kids to dance to every night. Nolan has a lot of residual hearing, so I think he probably gets a lot of it. Then again, music is pretty low frequency (middle C is at 250Hz), so he might be missing a lot, too. He likes it, and I guess that's all that matters!
We're a huge music loving family as well, but it's funny I have to remind myself to play music for Aiden as it is great therapy. But like you said, keeping the background noise to a minimum in a house of three kids is hard enough, so you'll usually find Aiden and I jamming to Laurie Berkner or Raffi while everyone's gone. On another note, while trying different ways to keep Aiden's CIs on in the car, I started playing classical music on our trips. Funny enough, he started keeping them on and seems calmed by the music!
I understand this completely, sadly. I always wonder what Henry hears, and what he is missing, especially where music is concerned.
The 1812 overture is one of our favorites around here. But like you, I haven't played it in a long time...I used to play it ALL the time when Henry was real little...before we knew he didn't hear well. And now, well...not so much. Maybe I will try.
I am so like you - I play music much more rarely than I should. We do love the 1812 Overture, though!
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