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Re: mouthpiece allergy...help!

Author: Bill Stutsman
Date: 2006-10-08 21:24

Lots of good advice here. The best advice is to get her to a good allergy clinic where the situation can be throughly and properly diagonsed. I'm going to assume that she is about 12. Allergies that appear at this age sometimes soon mellow or disappear. But you can't wait for that.

Believe it or not I had a similar problem with a student. The interior of the lips become puffy and felt dry even when they were moist. It did not effect gums. The girl was using a whitening toothpaste that somehow conflicted with the clarinet playing. A different toothpaste was tried and the problem disappeared.

If she is playing on a plastice mouthpiece, her band director/teacher should be smacked up the side of the head <grin>. Use hard rubber only or maybe crystal or wood later. Plastic mouthpieces are put in clarinet kits just to complete the outfit. The manufacturer assumes that the teacher will have it replaced by the teacher's prefered mouthpiece.

I suspect the reed. You can test different brands of reeds cheaply. It might be something in the treatment that her reed goes through in manufacturing.

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