For him, every song is fresh | chapman, music, hearing - News - The ...

ORANGE ? Austin Chapman sat in the doctor's office, his new hearing aids snugly in place.

For the first time in his life, he could properly hear.

Austin Chapman, 23, of Costa Mesa says, "I actually feel bad for hearing people; I wish more people could experience the power and peace of utter silence."

MICHAEL GOULDING, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Austin recommends?

Austin Chapman, 23, who recently gained the ability to hear, suggests these songs for your playlist:

"Bohemian Rhapsody," Queen

"Exodus," Bob Marley

"First Breath After Coma," Explosions in the Sky

"Staralfur," Sigur Ros

Brahms, any concerto

For more information about Chapman and his film-making, visit www.artofthestory.com

A cacophony of sound attacked Chapman that morning, Aug. 5, the day a new universe opened.

He heard his own shoe scraping across carpet.

Then the computer's whir.

Then the air conditioner's hum.

Then a computer keyboard's clack, clack, clacking...

Chapman, 23, an aspiring filmmaker from Costa Mesa, was startled by what were, to him, alien noises. When his best friend spoke he was shocked to learn that he had a slight rasp.

That evening, Chapman discovered something amazing, something that had eluded him his entire life ? a source of profound beauty that's as essential as oxygen to many members of the hearing world:

Music.

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Born completely deaf, Chapman over the years struggled ? unsuccessfully ? to enjoy music.

Hearing aids had given him some sense of bass and midtones, but nothing close to the full experience. Music, he says, used to sound like "trash" or "garbled gibberish." And he'd never understood the beauty of music; the emotion it can evoke.

That night, everything would change.

Chapman, new hearing aids in place, sat in a car with four of his closest friends, the volume on the car stereo cranked high.

What would be his first song? And how would Chapman react?

Months later, when asked to describe that moment, a look of ecstasy still washes over his face.

"Do you remember," he asks, "your first kiss?"

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It's a sunny day at Hart Park in Orange. Chapman, slender and wearing a dark hipster jacket over a colorful T-shirt, is gearing up to visit the nearby Providence Speech and Hearing Center.

It's a reunion of sorts. Providence is where, at age 9 months, Chapman was diagnosed as being "profoundly deaf."

But Chapman wouldn't be going back if he hadn't become that most modern category of human ? an Internet celebrity.

In early August, after getting his new hearing aids and after writing in his private journal what it was like to hear music, Chapman struggled with whether to share those feelings with others.

Eventually, he posted his story on the social news website Reddit. And, as part of that post, he asked the Reddit world for suggestions about what music he should listen to.

Soon, his inbox was flooded with song titles; a flood that's only recently started to abate. To date he's received nearly 15,000 suggestions from around the world.

Yahoo News picked up the story, and the folks at Providence tracked down Chapman to take him on a tour.

None of it, Chapman says, was planned or expected.

Chapman's parents, Molly and Peter, had reminded him this summer that he would be off their health insurance soon, and that he should get new hearing aids while he still had coverage. Chapman's previous devices were only four years old, so he wasn't expecting much of a difference.

But when he put in his new Swiss-made Phonak Naida S Premium (they cost $7,000 per ear), he says the sound quality was "a hundred times" better than his old hearing aid.

Suddenly, a man born into a world of silence was at the epicenter of a sonic earthquake ? for better and worse.

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Chapman had few friends until the fifth grade because he couldn't communicate with kids who could hear.

He taught himself how to read lips by watching movies with subtitles and matching the words to the actors' mouths.

He underwent 18 years of speech therapy, but still couldn't speak easily with strangers until his final years at Pepperdine University, where he graduated last year with a degree in creative writing.

Still, while being deaf has, at times, been a source of pain for Chapman, he's quick to add that the condition has been a refuge too; even a blessing.

"I actually feel bad for hearing people," he says. "I wish more people could experience the power and peace of utter silence."

Of course, he adds that the sound of wind rushing through trees or a bird's song is magic.

And the way he experiences his lifelong passion ? film ? has changed. He's able to understand some of his favorite movies ? the 1992 documentary "Baraka" and, ironically, the Mozart biopic "Amadeus" as complete works of words, sound and music.

Even a movie that Chapman has written, "Jester," a comedy/drama based partly on his own life, has been changed as a result of his new sense.

"After hearing for the first time, the script finally found its missing piece of the puzzle."

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Sitting in the passenger seat of his friend's car, wearing his new hearing aids, Chapman sat back and let the music consume him.

He says parts of Mozart's "Lacrimosa," from the composer's unfinished 1791 work "The Requiem Mass in D Minor," sounded like angels singing.

As he listened, tears rolled down Chapman's face. He tried to hide them but, when he looked at his four friends, he saw that they, too, were crying.

"At that moment, I finally understood the power of music."

Chapman compared the experience to seeing a color he had never seen before. He also compared it to that first kiss.

"The top of my head felt all weird and tingly," he says. "It felt like something washing through my brain ? a feeling I had never experienced."

Chapman's friend then played Elvis Presley's "Hound Dog" and Sigur Ros' "Gobbledigook." Each, he says, was another first kiss, like the real one he felt at age 9.

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Despite his new experiences with music and other sounds, Chapman usually keeps his hearing aids turned off.

"Most sounds are annoying," he explains. "And if I had to talk to people all day, I'd go crazy. When I can't hear, my thoughts become clear, and it's absolutely peaceful.

"I can sleep like a baby anywhere."

Chapman lives in silence when he eats, writes, golfs, goes wakeboarding or rock-climbing --- when he does almost anything except talk to people with whom he wants to talk, or when he listens to music.

"Silence," he says, "is still my favorite sound."

Still, to catch up on all the music he's missed out on, Chapman has embarked on a project. He's listening to recordings of the earliest written forms of music, and is moving, more or less chronologically, through all ages and genres.

He recommends something similar for everyone, regardless of how well they hear.

"Trust me on this," he says. "You don't want to miss out on a great song."

Contact the writer: 714-796-6704 or ghardesty@oregister.com

Source: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/chapman-376573-music-hearing.html

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