Huey Lewis can no longer listen to music due to hearing loss: “This is my cross to bear”
Grammy-winner Huey Lewis has opened up about his severe hearing loss and revealed that he is no longer able to listen to music.
In 2018, Lewis revealed he had been diagnosed with Ménière’s disease and cancelled his tour. He has not performed since, but he remains positive despite accepting that he can no longer practice the craft to which he dedicated his life.
According to the NHS, Ménière’s disease causes vertigo, tinnitus and can cause hearing to gradually decline over time. The rare disease is also incurable, but treatment to help ease symptoms is available.
While Lewis went public with his diagnosis in 2018, he explained in 2021 to AARP that he’d been living with Ménière’s for 25 years, but it had taken until then to escalate to an unmanageable level for him to continue as a performer despite suffering from vertigo for many decades.
In a new interview with People, Lewis shared: “I’m no spring chicken, so something’s going to happen at some point and this is my cross to bear.”
Explaining more about his condition, he added, “I have a cochlear implant in my head that now enables me to hear speech much better. I lost bilaterally, my hearing … the intense vertigo — knock on wood — I have kind of outgrown. I’m mildly dizzy all the time, and my hearing just went to zero. And now I have a cochlear implant, so I’m much better that way, but I can’t hear music.”
The removal of music from his life is an extremely difficult pill to swallow for Lewis, and the hardest part of having Ménière’s. He explained: “The worst part is that means it’s bad enough not to be able to perform and sing and play, but it’s really bad not to even be able to enjoy music.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Lewis said that making music and performing live is “the best feeling in the world”, which he misses greatly.
The singer admitted, “I’m never going to get there. I mean, I might get to where I can try to, and I’m not going to give up. I’m going to try. But geez, that kind of fun, that kind of great ride. I doubt I’m ever going to see that … feel that again.”
On a positive note, he shared, “The bottom line is I’m still a lucky guy and there are lots of people out there worse than I am. And it is very hard to remember that sometimes, but my kids help me do that.”
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