I can't hear the top end. Cymbals, sibilance, that shimmery high-frequency detail every audio reviewer loses their mind over. Mostly gone for me. I wear hearing aids, yet music is still one of the biggest parts of my day. Not background noise. Hours of it, properly listened to, every single day. I probably see more live music than anyone I know and by most people's logic that shouldn't add up. Yet here I am, still chasing good sound, apparently against my own audiogram's wishes.
Let me explain why that's not a contradiction.
Plot Twist: I Still Love Music
Tell someone you're hard of hearing and they assume music stopped mattering, like the hearing loss switched off the part of me that cares how things sound. It didn't. If anything, it sharpened it, because I've had to work out exactly what I'm actually listening for, instead of just vibing and hoping for the best. Funnily enough, I picked up a similar knack years earlier as a swimmer at the 2005 Deaflympics in Melbourne, working out how to do things properly without relying on cues everyone else takes for granted.
I'm not chasing what an audiophile with full-range hearing chases. I'm never going to hear the "air" around a cymbal hit, or catch some ultra-subtle harmonic in the highs a reviewer raves about like they've just discovered fire. That stuff isn't available to me anymore, and I've made my peace with that. What I can hear, clarity, punch, how clean the mids and bass sit together, matters more to me, not less. It's doing more of the work and I've built years of listening around getting the most out of it.
Forget Details. Give Me Clarity.
Here's the real point of this post. Good audio gear isn't just about resolving more detail. It's about how honestly it presents what's there. A well-built driver, a clean amp, a properly tuned EQ curve: that's the difference between music sounding like mud and music sounding like music, even when a chunk of the frequency range isn't reaching me the way it should.
When I went looking for a new pair of over-ears recently, I wasn't hunting for the pair with the most "detail retrieval," whatever that even means to my ears these days. I wanted punchy bass, solid mids, build quality that could handle actual use, not a spec sheet chasing frequencies I can't access and never asked for. I landed on a pair that nailed exactly that. The sound signature does the heavy lifting my ears can't, and honestly, that's a better use of $700 than paying for detail I'll never hear anyway.
Over-ear was never really a choice for me. Here’s why each option is, or isn’t, on the table:
In-ear buds: ruled out completely. Wearing a hearing aid and jamming a bud into the same ear canal doesn't work, and even if it somehow did, I'd be down another one of my senses, which defeats the entire purpose.
On-ear headphones: also a no-go. The cushion sits directly on top of the hearing aid and either sets off feedback squeal or just knocks the thing clean off my ear.
Over-ear headphones: the only option that works, every time.
Honestly, my ears have become pretty limited real estate at this point, not helped by the fact I've also got a genuinely massive head to fit all this onto. Hearing aids sit behind them, glasses arms run straight over the top of that, and headphones need to clear both without squashing anything.
Throw in the sunnies, which are less "sunny day accessory" and more "permanent glare sensitivity fixture," and, somehow, my keys and wallet occasionally end up hooked on there too. There’s a lot going on up there before a single note of music has even started.
The Other Half of the Equation: The Hearing Aids Themselves
Good headphones are only half the story. I've spent years going back and adjusting and tuning my own hearing aids, trying to get them closer to right for music, not just speech. Many hearing aids do have a "music" program. What people don't realise is that it's usually not some purpose-built system, it's basically the same speech program with a couple of things switched off (noise reduction, feedback management) and the EQ nudged. It's a preset, not a rebuild. No secret menu, no cheat code.
And there's a hard ceiling under all of it that has nothing to do with the settings menu. Everyone's ear canal is shaped differently, and that shape decides how much a hearing aid can be vented, which decides how much gain it can push before it starts feeding back on itself, that awful whistle every hearing aid wearer knows and nobody has ever once found charming. It's a straightforward anatomy problem, not a settings one.
The tighter the seal someone needs for a more severe loss, the earlier that ceiling shows up, often right in the frequency range where the most help is needed. If that sounds like a lot, here's the plain version: everyone's ears are built a bit differently, and that shape puts a cap on how loud any hearing aid can go before it starts squealing. So there's a real limit to how far you can turn things up to compensate for anyone. You can't just crank a hearing aid the way you'd crank an amp. Past a certain point, physics gets in the way before the hearing loss does, and physics doesn't negotiate.
One Highlight Along the Way
Music being this central to my life has taken me to some interesting places. I did DJ and MC work for weddings, birthdays and engagements for about ten years. Reading a room, building a set, getting the sound right for the people actually in it, and occasionally fielding a request for a song I could not, in fact, hear the chorus of. That's not what this post is about, but it's proof of how far "properly hard of hearing and still deeply into sound" can take you.
Not Just a Nice Story
This isn’t a "look how well I’ve adapted" post. It’s a nudge. Hearing loss isn’t one story. Some people lose the highs, some lose the lows, some lose clarity in noise before anything else. But the assumption that hearing loss means checking out of music, or audio gear, or sound quality generally? That’s crazy. And it’s the kind of assumption that quietly shapes products, marketing, even how gear gets reviewed. None of it is built with people like me in mind.
That's the actual overlap with what we do at See Me Please. Good design, audio gear included, gets built by talking to the people who use it differently. Not by guessing. I didn't need anyone to guess what I needed from a pair of headphones. I could've told them, in detail, probably with diagrams. It's probably why I've unofficially become Chief of Music around the office (in reality I just run the music channel on Slack, but let a man have his title).
So What's the Point?
If you're hard of hearing, or you love someone who is, don't assume music, the hi-fi hobby, or hours of listening every day are off the table. The criteria just shift. Chase clarity. Chase honesty in the sound. The highs might be gone but there's still plenty worth listening for, and my hearing aids and I intend to keep doing exactly that.
About Daniel Leighton
Daniel Leighton represented Australia in swimming at the Deaf Olympics, is a lover of heavy metal, and is deeply passionate about demystifying misconceptions about disability. Legally blind since his mid-thirties due to a degenerative eye disease, and hard of hearing since birth, Daniel was diagnosed with Usher's syndrome from a young age. He works across the APAC banking and finance sector for See Me Please. Daniel's influence has impact on a global scale, having recently joined the W3C working group which shapes global web accessibility standards.
FAQ
Can someone who is hard of hearing still enjoy music?
Yes. Hearing loss changes what someone hears, not whether they care how it sounds. Daniel Leighton, See Me Please's Engagement Lead, listens to hours of music every day and attends more live shows than most people with full-range hearing, focusing on clarity, punch, and how cleanly the mids and bass sit together rather than the high-frequency detail he can no longer access.
Why do over-ear headphones work better than earbuds for hearing aid wearers?
In-ear buds don't work alongside a hearing aid already in the ear canal, and on-ear headphones press their cushion directly onto the hearing aid, which triggers feedback squeal or knocks it loose. Over-ear headphones are the only style that clears both the hearing aid and any glasses arms without pressing on either.
Can a hearing aid's music mode fully restore music quality?
No. Most hearing aids' music programs are the same speech program with noise reduction and feedback management switched off and the EQ nudged, not a purpose-built system. There's also a physical limit: everyone's ear canal shape caps how much gain a hearing aid can push before feedback (the whistle every hearing aid wearer knows) starts, regardless of how the settings are tuned.
