Tinnitus is a phantom sound (ringing of the ears) that affects quality of life for millions of people around the world and is usually, but not always, associated with hearing impairment. In some cases, insults to the somatosensory system, such as tooth absences or disturbances of the temporo-mandibular joint can also result in tinnitus. Connections between these two sensory systems can explain why tinnitus can be modulated in loudness and pitch by somatic maneuvers such as jaw- clenching and eye movements. Evidence will be provided that deafferentation of central auditory structures leads to increased neuron spontaneous firing rates and neural synchrony in the hearing loss regions that signal the phantom sounds. Crossmodal compensations in subcortical structures may contribute to central re- organization of auditory structures by providing aberrant, excitatory connections that result in hyperactivity.