Friday


It's washing day today ... instruments, not clothes! This one is on loan to an established player who was complaining that one of the valves doesn't work properly so I brought it home to check it before I took it for repair. They are all shown how to care for their instruments but this particular player clearly hasn't bothered at all. When I dismantled it, I found that most of the slides are seized solid and the tubing is full of mould. Not only a health issue but an expensive repair for the parents - the band finances repairs due to wear and age of instruments but parents have to pay for any repairs due to lack of maintenance or through dropping the instrument. I'm speaking to the parents tomorrow and will take the instrument to the repairers next week.

'A' will be here later to clean the house. I've tidied round as much as I can but the house is full of instruments so I will ask her to just hoover and clean where she can for today, rather than have to keep moving everything. They will be moved back to storage tomorrow and I'll be glad of the space again.

After she's gone I'll make a start on some cooking for the freezer, probably bolognese sauce and a veggie chilli for starters. I'm having a roast dinner for my main meal today so I'll plate up an extra meal for tomorrow and then the rest of the veg will be frozen for bubble and squeak.

Apart from that I have a couple of phone calls to make on behalf of the band, and then just need to get the paperwork ready for the new starters for tomorrow - three that I know about but hopefully a couple more will turn up as well.

Comments

  1. Oh, dear. Good luck wirh the visit. WHat a shame the instrument has been neglected like that. Definitely a health issue as well as costly.
    xx

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    Replies
    1. I think it's probably time to remind all the players about maintaining their instruments. Maybe after Christmas we can have a session on it, with parents in attendance, so everyone is in no doubt about what to do. The health side of things is the biggest worry - the build up of mould was considerable so the child has been breathing in mould spores for quite a long time.

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  2. Oh that poor un-kept instrument - I like your idea of conducting a maintenance workshop with parents in tow. I wonder if this particular child has had a cough of late or a lot of sniffles. Your day sounds quite full. Happy Weekend.

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    Replies
    1. The child constantly has colds, coughs and sniffles so it would be difficult to tell is the spores are causing any health problems. The family have been responsible for this particular instrument for about a year but the child was coughing and sniffling all the time with the previous two instruments, both of which were clean and maintained after a fashion!

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  3. I had no idea brass instruments needed to be washed! Shows you how much I know! An instruments maintenance workshop sounds like a very good idea! I was going to suggest have a maintenance log that the parents are required to sign and bring in on a regular basis, but, some parents might just sign it without making sure that the maintenance was done!

    Hope you have a lovely day.

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    Replies
    1. Yes, they need to be washed, dried, oiled and greased. We do spot checks and sign off on the maintenance record for each instrument.

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  4. Oh I remember taking our children's instruments in for cleaning -- of course, most years we procrastinated too close to the beginning of school and worried that they would not have them back in time. The music shop was always amazing and it worked out.

    Also I don't know if it was a good thing or not, but if the kids had a cold or other sickness, I always ran medicinal alcohol through their instruments, or in case of the daughter's saxophone, made sure she used new reeds.

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