A hearing aid (30) includes a microphone (71), a signal processor (20) and an output transducer (22), and the signal processor (20) includes a set of audio processing parameters mapped to a set of stored noise classes (12) and a noise classification block (8) for classifying the background noise for the purpose of optimizing the frequency response in order to minimize the effects of the background noise. The hearing aid may further include a neural net for controlling the frequency response. A method for reducing a noise component in a signal includes the steps of classification of the noise component, comparing the noise component to a set of known noise components, and adapting the processed audio signals according to a corresponding set of frequency response parameters.