Pimples and surface sores – if you can ignore the pain, you can play well
Herpes viruses cause canker sores and fever blisters
The virus is in the body forever; symptoms manifest when immune system is weakened due to stress, poor life style, etc. A health immune system prevents problems
Prevention: take better care of yourself, reduce stress; can take vitamin B, L-Iysine (in vitamin B) – available at Wal-Mart in herbal supplements
Fever blisters – Colgate Peroxyl, ginger root tea, ether (no longer for sale), Orajel,\Mouthaid
Chapped lips – don’t lick your lips in cold weather; roll red of lips in so it doesn’t show
Good: Chapstick, Pucker Ups, Chop Saver
Bad: Daily Conditioning Treatment, Blistex, Carmex (contains camphor)
Bruised lips – caused by too much pressure for too long
Lips hurt, are tender, sometimes have bluish color – can take days, weeks months to heal
Prevention is best
Ice treatment: ice lips down ASAP after pressing too hard to prevent swelling;
NEVER put ice directly on lips; cold water fountain works great – run cold water
over the lips until they feel numb; repeat throughout the day until the swelling is gone
AFTER the swelling is gone, you can apply heat to increase the healing; if the swelling is not gone, heat only increases the swelling
Gentle playing can help healing, but mezzo everything – medium loud, medium high, medium long, with lots of rest
Split inside lip can happen after using too much pressure and sleeping with mouth open; can be quite painful, but you can play well if you ignore the pain
Tired chaps – overworked – best to skip a day, if possible, or very easy warm ups Maurice Andre skipped a day after heavy piccolo trumpet recording sessions
Chops forecast illness – about 3 days lead time; you think, “I haven’t been practicing a lot more than usual, I have been practicing enough, I wonder what’s wrong…” and you get sick.
Prevention: when this happens, take care of yourself immediately; sometimes you can head off the illness Tired body causes tired chops, tired brain; not much you can do except try to play well; better yet, get some rest!