Heya! I got my clarinet about 1 1/2 months ago or so and I`ve been practicing it almost non-stop ever since. For the first two weeks I practiced almost 5 hours a day and it kind of went down from that, but anyway, after playing alot each day for about a month and a half, I`ve noticed some different things. The corners of my mouth have been feeling pretty sore lately and they feel alot more... um, muscully, kind of like I can "flex" my mouth or something. I just wanna know, does that always start happening when you`re building up an embochoure?

Heya. Everyone has the same problem as beginners and even professionals. Thats the part of your mouth that just gets tired. Long-tones are the best excersizes in the world for this problem. Play with your metronome on quarter note equals 60 and start on open G and go up to any interval (2nds to octaves) and come back down to open G. Go all the way up a C scale until you can`t play any higher. All the time you can`t take your mouth off the mouthpiece. Breathe through your nose and through the clarinet and when you hear spit inside your clarinet just blow harder (making sure to maintain tempo) and the spit will blow out. Reply if you need any more explanation. Good luck and keep practicing! It sounds like you are doing awesome!