Author: vboboe
Date: 2009-02-24 19:49
you say 'hand' blisters rather than 'finger' blisters -- exactly where on the hands are these blisters? Yours? or somebody you know, perhaps playing on a brass instrument?
second D's idea to play instrument with freshly washed hands, most especially in sweaty playing conditions
the other thing is to clean the keys or metal in direct contact with skin, and do that daily during sweaty playing conditions, especially if skin tends to be a bit sensitive already
hot sweaty fingertips, or hands, put warm saline solution in direct contact with silver or brass, this causes a chemical reaction, minute deposits of salts are left behind and if the metal isn't cleaned often enough, these deposits become 'sticky' so that makes for a lot of skin friction which can readily produce blisters; also, over time may build up concentrated areas of chemical deposits which could cause blistering dermatitis
to clean the metal, use damp rag wrung out in dish-detergent (cuts the grease and dissolves water soluble salts), may need more than one pass, then air-dry, then pass lightly oiled rag (use fresh key oil) to smear all the metal surfaces, this helps protect the silver a little bit from saline sweat, and for the player this oil film makes skin-metal contact smooth and silky to the touch (no need to nose the pinkies for slides ...)
if the silver's tarnished, use one of those silver polishing cloths first, then the damp detergent rag, then the oil finish
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