When the University’s Redcoat Band riles up football fans with the Bulldog fight song, what’s good for morale may not be good for the ears.

“I think you would probably be shocked at how loud the UGA stadium is at a football game – it’s probably over a 110 decibels,” said Robin Hardin, audiologist for Athens-Oconee Audiology. “When you get 100,000 people screaming, and the band playing and the person on the PA system, we oftentimes don’t realize the cumulative effect of noise exposure over many years.”

Since University bands have no protocol in place for addressing hearing issues, Nikk Pilato, assistant director of bands, decided to take matters into his own hands when he came to the University last year.

“The beginning of every year, I always make a speech to the Redcoats about it because they’re the ones that are probably affected the most,” Pilato said. “Since they are in Sanford and they’re all packed up tight like that and when the drums hit a certain rim shot, that can go all the way up to 115 [decibels].”

During his doctoral work, Pilato realized how loud the smaller concert halls would get during rehearsals, but he didn’t discover exactly what level the noise reached until he bought a decibel meter.

“I discovered in that room, it was spiking up to about 110,” he said. “For some comparison, prolonged exposure to 90 decibels is what starts giving you some kind of hearing loss.”

Pilato then purchased ear plugs in bulk for his students.

“Indoor rehearsals are especially dangerous when you have people playing loud tunes in a confined space,” said Rebecca Frazer, a senior from Warner Robins. “Ear plugs simply mute the music without distorting the sound.”

Frazer, who plays the flute in the concert band and is a drum major in the marching band, said many members of the band have found the high-quality ear plugs Pilato provides helpful.

“The difference between these and the cheap foam ones is that the cheap foam ones suppress all strata of frequency – that means it’s always going to sound a little muffled,” Pilato said. “These only reduce frequencies by about 20 decibels, which in most cases, is going to save your ears.”

Christina Swoope, a senior from Alpharetta, is a student conductor and drum major for the marching band.

“The first time you realize how loud the Redcoats are is when you sit down for the first indoor rehearsal,” Swoope said. “There are 400 people in there and you feel like your hair is blowing out.”

Since Redcoat rehearsals can be as loud as 110 decibels, Pilato decided to give his students an informal hearing test to see if they could hear certain tones.

“You’re supposed to hear between 20 and 20,000 hertz, but I had a kid in one of my classes who couldn’t pick up the 10,000 range,” Pilato said. “That means in a crowded room, conversations are going to be really difficult and who knows how it’s going to be for them down the road.”

Pilato said he hopes his students will begin taking hearing tests on their own.

“You know how it is when you’re college age – you’re still invincible,” Pilato said. “They say, ‘My ears are still good,’ but basically they’re killing tiny little hairs in their ears called cilia – and that’s hearing damage.”

“When you start climbing to the 130 to 140 decibel range, that’s when you start feeling pain . and when you start killing off those little hairs, you’re not feeling as much pain because you’re not hearing those sounds anymore,” he said. “It just means you can’t hear as well as you used to.”

But Pilato said it’s not only the Redcoats who have to worry about hearing loss. Pilate said everyone should be mindful of sound levels and make sure they avoid standing too close to the speakers at concerts.

“A lot of people actually go to concerts and want to be near [the speakers] and they have ringing in their ears for days,” he said. “We live in the loudest age there’s ever been with iPhones and iPods – I go to the gym and I hear peoples’ iPods from 20 feet away . that’s got to be 120 decibels at least and they don’t realize they’re hurting themselves.”