 The Clarinet BBoard
|
Author: Carl L
Date: 2001-06-09 14:24
Old habits die hard. Two lasting gifts form my Marine Corps days were: one, a free, all-expenses paid tour of Southeast Asia, and, two, waking at 5:00 each morning. Now an old middle-aged geazer, I still find myself chugging that first cup of coffee around 5:10. We had a good deal of discussion on my tuba BBS about this and I was interested in the reaction of my clarinet brothers and sisters- does coffee affect your horn? I mean, is there a physical danger to the workings or wood of the clarinet, drinking coffee (alcohol?) while practicing? How about some feedback from you coffee drinkers? I know I'm not the only addict combining morning coffee with practice time.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-06-09 14:29
I can't tell if coffee changes my clarinet playing - I've never been without coffee for long enough to find out...
Being in the service for 8 years left me a few things, too. An addiction to cigarettes that I was able to kick about 10 or 12 years ago (still addicted, just don't smoke anymore) and an addition to coffee that I don't want to kick ;^)
Along with the SE Asian tour (based out of Japan for 5 years - which is where I found my wife - yet another thing I can bless/blame the service for 8^)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Bill
Date: 2001-06-09 14:57
I was a heavy coffee drinker before I started a 20 year hitch in the military, and I continue to drink many cups per day. I think the Pepsi I drink, betwen cups of coffee, is much worse for the horn.
I spent a year in Viet Nam, and didn't have an opportunity to do any dating (the romantic kind), but married my wife while I was in Korea.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: William
Date: 2001-06-09 14:57
I always drink my coffee black and have never noticed any obvious problems usually associated with food, such as sticky pads, "gunk" buildup or smell. If I were to add a lot of cream, sugar or other flavorings to my caffine, then that might cause a problem. As far as I know, the chemical components of your average "cupa Jo" will not harm the wooden body of the clarinet, its metal parts or its mouthpiece and reed. Even you plastice, "Resoniters" out there need not worry!!! One advantage from my "addiction" comes to mind, however--when I am holding my coffee cup, my embouchure also gets a break!! Good (to the last drop) Clarineting!!!!
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Fred
Date: 2001-06-09 15:09
. . . why do you think they made the horn black in the first place? I'd like to think that a coffee drinker influenced that a bit.
(Please . . . no historical corrections. I hate it when facts stand in the way of a good story.)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: David Kinder
Date: 2001-06-09 16:41
I DO know that coffee isn't good for YOU, but I have no knowledge on how it will affect your clarinet playing. Now, if you have coffee stained teeth, will your pads change color to match? Just a joke... :^) I can't think of anything else that can happen - unless you completely forget to swab out your clarinet everytime you play.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-06-09 16:46
Actually, no, it hasn't been proved that coffe is deleterious to health. Some studies show just the opposite (the ones paid for by the Coffee Council, anyway 8^).
Back to clarinetting ...
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: jerry
Date: 2001-06-09 17:35
Is that where some of the famous clarinetist get the warbling sound (I'm not sure what the musical term for it would be but I have heard A. Shaw do it and wondered......)?
I hope never buy a used clarinet from someone who smoked and played, yuck. Nothing worse than a reformed smoker. The USMC started me on smokes.........it stuck with me 35 years and final after enphasima(sp) and unable to breathe at night, I quit 10 years ago.
Coffee gives me instrument problems but that started long before I started the clarinet. And my 30 month tour of the Far East didn't have an impact on any of these topics.
Been on the coffee since I was 14, and still at it (allbeit much to the chagrin of my cardiologist).
~ jerry
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Fred R
Date: 2001-06-09 19:14
I've never served in the military but I am big (huge) coffee drinker on my own. Started when I was about 14 (about the same time I started clarinet). When I get home from work I generally take the stuff left over from the morning throw in some ice and drink that, (a practice my wife abhors) sometimes while practicing. Other than a slight and occasional discoloration of a reed now and then, I have never noticed any problem with the instrument.I think this is related to a recent thread concerning spit vs. condensation. If coffee does get into the instrument it is at a molecular level and too minute to have any real effect. Whether its good bad or indifferent I've been to jazz cubs and watched horn players drink alcohol and smoke while playing during sets.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: bob gardner
Date: 2001-06-10 02:48
I think the only thing that you have to worry about is things that add an odor to your horn. I don't belive that coffee or tea is one of them. i agree with Jerry. Smoking stinks, and so do thier horns. i'm an ex-myself.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2001-06-10 03:07
It depends on whether you blow air or coffee down the clarinet.
Some people blow saliva and dead mouth tissue down their instrument (Some blow material from their noses over the exterior!), so they would also blow the coffee down. We all know that coffee is a sticky mess when the water from a spill evaporates, so for those people that same sticky mess would be develop inside the bore.
Those who just blow air down the clarinet should not have a problem.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: willie
Date: 2001-06-10 04:29
I too am a coffee-holic, mostly due to 20+ years in the Coast Guard. The only problem I ever experienced was sticky pads when I used a dab of real sugar to take the "edge" of some of that "500 mile" stuff my Chief used to make for the boat crews. Later, when I had to start watching my weight a bit, I used a dab of Sweet&Low in lieu of the real stuff. This (and a good cleaning) got rid of the stickies. Now if I can just quit smoking. I just "won" a mint condition Leblanc contra on eBay and I need the lungs.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: mw
Date: 2001-06-11 03:59
Aw. c'mon .... I love my Starbucks. Wouldn't leave home or office without it.
BUT, I can brush my teeth before playing.
Man/Woman, you guys are getting some XZ$^%^& in those tone holes!
Best,
mw
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: mw
Date: 2001-06-11 05:39
I quit smoking 6 years this past May. It was hard but worth it. (and, I'd be the last person who thought they could do it!) I was helped in part due to the experience I had losing 2 close friends to Cancer. Also, it was a terrible waste of time & money ... and I subjected my family to the rigors of living with a smoker.
Couple the savings from not smoking with my savings from giving up golf to play the clarinet & you could buy 1 1/2 Opus' .... (or is that Opii?) : ) (Golf is very expensive --- time, clubs, balls, green fees, carts, gambling that sawbuck on each 9 holes, hats, gloves. clothes, special shoes, replacement spikes, tees, bags, lessons, head covers, practice aparatus, etc ad nauseum)
Of course, I might have stuck with Golf & then I could have practiced a Buffet Greenline on the TeeBox of every hole when the course was stacked up!
Best,
mw
PS Smoke is hard on everything ... including clarinets.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Mark Charette, Webmaster
Date: 2001-06-11 05:41
mw wrote:
> Couple the savings from not smoking with my savings from giving
> up golf to play the clarinet & you could buy 1 1/2 Opus' ....
> (or is that Opii?) 
Opera
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: mw
Date: 2001-06-11 16:21
Mark, thank you. It goes to show that you learn something everyday!!! [ I kinda liked OPII ... only becauise of my pronunciation O-PIE ... ]
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Brenda Siewert
Date: 2001-06-12 15:05
Coffee? What about diet Dr. Pepper? That's my problem. However, I do like to go to Barnes and Noble and get a nice big cup of foamy stuff to sip while reading books about clarinets.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-06-12 15:27
Brenda Siewert wrote:
>
> However, I do like to go to Barnes and Noble and get a nice big
> cup of foamy stuff to sip while reading books about
> clarinets.
Cya there. I spent the 5.95 for one of the mugs that gets you .25 off on refills. It paid for itself in a week ;^)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: mw
Date: 2001-06-12 16:35
Gordon, I like your O-Pee-Eye. We'll have to apply to Webster's or whomever handles this sort of thing. Maybe we can get in on Slang!
Long live (Plurals, err ) OPERA!
mw
PS - Everybody at my office like this discussion (& Mark Charette's answer). No one in our office knew the answer. [ We have 2 Valedictorians in the midst, which probably only show that they have lost some serious brain cells while working here!]
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Brenda Siewert
Date: 2001-06-12 18:17
<<Cya there. I spent the 5.95 for one of the mugs that gets you .25 off on refills. It paid for itself in a week ;^)>>
So, are we talking Arborium (sp?) Barnes and Nobles? That's my favorite one. You might run into my husband and me some Sat. afternoon. If we can get a parking place.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-06-12 19:12
Brenda - normally Lakeline in the evening - after dinner I drive down often just to read. Look for the short guy reading the "Skeptical Inquirer" or science mags and has a brown Barnes & Noble travel mug ...
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: John Gould
Date: 2001-06-13 00:55
A theory on the plural of Opus.
Corpus - corps
Opus - Oorps
A platypus joined the Corps and played an opus.
2 platyporps joined at the Corpus Callosum played Oorps in the Corps with possums.
Good night.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Wes
Date: 2001-06-19 16:59
Well, my mother passed on at the age of 90 from drinking too much coffee for many years.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2001-06-20 14:14
How were all the other factors of her life eliminated. Perhaps she died from having a wrinkeld skin, or lack of sex..........
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
The Clarinet Pages
|
 |
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
