[killface]

I'm looking to create a "Tom Hanks at Normandy Beach" moment where a huge cap ship explodes nearby, deafening/stunning the pilot for a short while as a swarm of enemy fighters soar into the debris field and attack.  I have a long, droning "ear-ringing" sound to play as this happens, but I need the music and sound effects to cut out for a short while.  Any good way of getting this done?

[FreeSpaceFreak]

I think that play-sound-from-file automatically mutes all other sounds... Not sure though.

[Ransom]

It does not, and as far as I know there's no efficient way to achieve this. You can switch the music off and on with change-soundtrack, and if you were really determined weapon sounds could be dealt with by creating silent versions of all weapons the player's going to encounter during the soundless event, then swapping them out with the set-weapon sexps. I don't know if there's any way to silence things like explosions, though.