Marshall Chasin

Marshall Chasin, AuD, is an audiologist and the Director of Auditory Research at the Musicians’ Clinics of Canada, Adjunct Professor at the University of Toronto (in Linguistics), Associate Professor in the School of Communication Disorders and Sciences at the Western University. He is the author of over 200 articles and 7 books including Musicians and the Prevention of Hearing Loss. Dr. Chasin has been the recipient of many awards over the years including the 2012 Queen Elizabeth II Silver Jubilee Award for service to Canada and the Canada 150 Medal in 2017. He has developed a new TTS app called Temporary Hearing Loss Test app.

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Music therapy for sudden sensori-neural hearing loss…. but beware!

Marshall Chasin

I recently saw a music producer whose ears are her life – and unfortunately she suffered a sudden partial sensori-neural hearing loss in one ear. We were lucky enough to have her seen by an otolaryngologist within hours and after an MRI, steroid injections were started. So far, this is not an unusual situation and course of action although, with a few

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Are Polaroids needed all over again?

Marshall Chasin

I recall a time, not too long ago, when the only form of photographic evidence admissible in a court of law was a Polaroid shot. This was a self-developing technique and as such could not be altered. With the current form of photography and digital images, a 14 year old kid could alter it and even give me Justin Beiber’s hair.

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The Influence of Technology on Music for People who are Hard of Hearing

Marshall Chasin

By Natalie Wilson Natalie Wilson is an avid music lover and guitar player who has dedicated her life to sharing what she knows on her blog. You’ll find a wide range of topics on her blog, including reviews, tutorials, and tips for musicians. Feel free to contact Natalie: [email protected]. Music is a universal art form that everyone can connect with. Despite the

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Noise and the European Tree Frog

Marshall Chasin

I don’t know about you, but when I am stressed by loud noise, my vocal sac coloration decreases and I’m just not as attractive as I can be. I have tried everything in my makeup kit to improve things, but alas, background noise can be deadly. Thankfully I am not a European Tree Frog though. An interesting experiment was carried

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Using musicians and non-musicians in research

Marshall Chasin

I have long been concerned that perhaps the musician is not the best type of research subject when it comes to assessing how a particular hearing aid algorithm or circuit may represent amplified music. Researchers, such as Dr. Nina Kraus, have spent their entire working careers trying to figure out what makes a musician tick. And ultimately the strategies used,

Maybe a sledgehammer is what we need?

Marshall Chasin

I know that it is a great pastime for all of us to take a few moments and go through our old journals to see if we missed any important articles. Well, I ran in to this old article which I had marked for future reading and even had downloaded a pdf. It was sitting in a file called READ THIS. Obviously

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Sexism in the broadcast industry

Marshall Chasin

One of the larger embarrassments of the 1960s and 1970s, other than bell bottoms, was the systemic sexism in the broadcast industry. Using pseudoscience, women were told that they could not be broadcasters because the pitch of their voices was too high. Specifically, if the speaker’s fundamental frequency was high, as in a woman’s or child’s voice, then the harmonics were spaced

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Things change

Marshall Chasin

I have been a clinical audiologist for about 35 years now and I am surprised when I look back just a few years and find that what I told my clients either was wrong, or merely simplistic, based on today’s knowledge. Front line clinicians always find this in their first couple of years of work- we are still trying to

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Is more necessarily better?

Marshall Chasin

Custom hearing aids, whether they are in-the-ear, canal, CIC, or IIC, have acoustic pathways between the receiver and the end of the bore that are on the order of 10 mm (or less). This is also the case with occluding RIC style hearing aids. And this is also the case with in-ear monitors that musicians use. But let’s take a

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Masking and Music – Phase – part 4

Marshall Chasin

This 4-part series of blogs overviews the phenomenon of masking and is written for the musician, not the audiologist. The first three parts (upwards spread of masking, downwards spread of masking, and temporal masking) relate to the function and structure of the cochlea and associated neural structures, whereas this last part (phase) refers to the acoustics of any room. Strictly