Dec
14th
2012
Instruments Are Like Children · 1:51am Dec 14th, 2012
They rely entirely on your care and the work of your hands to do anything. I've learned this the hard way, because not consistently cleaning my clarinet has caught up to me. Now it has to have the pads and a few screws replaced because it's become a gooey, bacterial paradise. Lucky me, I know a guy who has an extra clarinet that he's loaning me, so I narrowly avoided being screwed.
The moral of the story is this: wind musicians, clean your instruments regularly.
Vivat nox.
-ClarinetOverlord
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ClarinetOverlord · 231 views
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I remember when my friend didn't swab his out for a month. There was that stuff on the entire inside of the thing. After I made him realize that putting it to your mouth probably wasn't such a good idea, he cleaned it.
But I've done worse things to mine, though. I've been known to hit my clarinet against stands when I mess up solos in jazz. I also throw it up and catch it a lot. I'd be a lot more careful with it if it wasn't twice as old as me.
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I'm also convinced that the keys on my friend's clarinet are smaller than mine are. Maybe I'm just crazy, but they feel smaller on his than mine.
More on topic, I've learned my lesson from this fiasco. Once he's 100% playable again, I'll actually start cleaning Todd after I use him.
Your clarinet is named Todd?
Well I gotta say my friend, I'm glad things haven't gone astray, and I'm glad you don't have to lose any playtime. I can vouch for those of us that don't play wind instruments...that upkeep of your instrument is vital. I didn't play Mia(My acoustic guitar) for a couple months, and she was so out of tune, that my strings actually lost tone. I ended up having to adjust the truss bar, replace the strings, tighten the tuning keys, and completely cleaning the whole thing.
...I have yet to neglect Mia since.
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I named him after Todd Levy, one of the greatest clarinetist to ever grace the Earth next to Benny Goodman. So, from now on, my friend's spare clarinet will be called Benny.
I named all my instruments; Harvey the ukulele, Goliath the drum set, and an ocarina with an undecided name. I'm thinking Melvin or Gage.
Weird thing is that every musician on fanfiction sites names all their instruments, but no one I know in real life does that.
I call my acoustic Mia, my electric is Joe, drums are Neil...and my very first guitar was named Benjamin...after the lead singer of Breaking Benjamin. All the musicians I know irl have names for their instruments.
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And we will continue to name our instruments until we all lose our minds.
Sounds like a plan...oh, wait. I've never been sane!
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Yeah, you can't lose what you never had. In my case, mental illness runs in the family.
Same here brony, same here.