>During part of the concert in the late afternoon, I was about 1.5 miles away in an open field working (futilely) on my golf swing.
>My hearing is awful, and I could that band clearly.
>I can only guess about what that kind of noise is doing to the hearing of band members and people nearby.

Technology solved that one long ago, AFAIK - the main speakers are pointing to the audience, not to the band. Actually the major problem is, most of the time, when the band can't hear themselves. So they have monitors - those catbox sized speakers on the edge of the stage, so they can.

Last time I was near the stage on a big concert was the Stones in Budapest 1995. I was standing about 1/3 to the right, about 10m from the line or 15 from the stage. There was not enough people to dampen the sound yet, and I felt that the sound pressure was definitely doing something bad to my innards. So I moved to the center, some five meters back, where it stopped. By my guesstimate, the total surface of the speaker panels was about 60 square meters, which is a small apartment for a family of four around here.

I think I was hearing 1000Hz until the morning. Which means I was old already :). Back in february 1971*. when Status Quo played here, I was sitting between the speaker boxes, and by the time I walked home the beep had stopped. Eh, youth.

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* or was it january? I remember Mungo Jerry having a concert a few weeks later, and that one was in february.