title: Noise exposure of musicians of a ballet orchestra.
abstract: With over 70 dancers and its own orchestra, The National Ballet of Canada ranks amongst the world's top dance companies. It performs three seasons annually: fall, winter and summer, plus many shows of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker. The 70-strong orchestra plays an average of 360 hours/year including rehearsals and performances. Rehearsals are held at two locations: one in a ballet rehearsal room with little or no absorption, and the other in an acoustically treated location. Performances are held in the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto. The present survey was done at the request of the National Ballet, since the musicians complained of excessive sound levels and were concerned about possible hearing losses. The survey was performed using five dosimeters Quest Mod 300 during 10 performances of the ballet Romeo and Juliet by Sergei Prokofiev, deemed as the noisiest in the whole repertoire. Results of the survey indicate that the noise exposure levels from only the orchestra's activities do not present risk of hearing loss. Exposure due to other musical activities was, however, not included.
authors.affiliation: Edward Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, University of Toronto, Canada. chengliang.qian@utoronto.ca
authors.forename: Cheng Liang
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Qian
authors.forename: Alberto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Behar
authors.forename: Willy
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Wong
mesh_terms: D000162:Acoustics / Q000295:instrumentation; D002170:Canada; D003615:Dancing; D005160:Facility Design and Construction; D006317:Hearing Loss, Noise-Induced / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology*; D006801:Humans; D009146:Music; D009623:Noise, Occupational / Q000009:adverse effects*; D016273:Occupational Exposure / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D018570:Risk Assessment; D013018:Sound Spectrography; D017132:Workplace