I have a student who just got braces and he's totally miserable, won't play and is skipping lessons. So . . . I did a little google search for help. I found an article about a trumpet player, John Colson, who actually wrote the book on it: "Braces & Brass." I haven't see or heard of this before. It looks very interesting to me. He's a link to the article.

http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/537265/

Valerie Wells
http://bebabe.wordpress.com/
http://www.beforhorn.blogspot.com/

I have seen that book. I'm not going to say Colson is wrong but I will say I don't agree with is school of thought. I have been playing and teaching for over 30 years and I don't have issues with any of my students when they get braces on or get braces off.

Although there is an adjustment period of about 4 days to get back to normal playing tone and range there are no other side effects and certainly nothing so dibilitating as "premanent calluses" that destroy a tone forever. ALL my students have nice good quality sounds. If they don't then that is what we work on, tone. If there is not a good tone there is no reason to study anything else.

You know, if you've got a struggling student with braces, I would just work him/her on stuff out of this book. That's what I've done with mine.

http://www.kjos.com/sub_section.php?division=1&series=14

Well, I haven't read "Braces & Brass" yet, so I'll reserve judgement. But I think he's a little uninformed on human pathology. There's no such thing as a callus inside the mouth. Calluses can only form on external skin where there's keratin. But there are other permanent lesions that can form inside the mouth from constant irritation such as dental appliances, jagged teeth, biting, etc.
Fibromas and mucoceles can form and the only way to remove them it through surgery. Fibromas are very common and unless they form in the exact wrong spot, they most likely will not interfer with embouchure function. A cluster of scar tissue can form in an area where multiple cuts form. This can "feel" like a callus because it's firmer than surrounding tissue. Over time, however, most scars in the mouth soften and diminish to the point that they are usually imperceptible.

I think Prof. Colson may have been referring to fibromas or clusters of scars when he talked about calluses. Regardless of the terms, Colson's obviously had some experience with one or more players who never recovered after wearing braces due to changes in their mouth.

I personally believe there's always hope and room for improvement as long as we have lips & can breath... but I believe I can learn something from Prof. Colson even if he did misstate something of a technical nature.

Anyway, I'm mainly interested in this book so I can learn more about the specific protective measures that can be taken. My student who's new to braces needs a "gimmick" to give him the confidence he needs to continue.

Re: "Foundations for Superior Performance" I use that book every day. I love it! It was recommended to me by a horn player who still uses it every day even though he's a professional that's played horn for over 50 years! Great idea; great book! I don't know why I never thought of starting my students on that book. Thanks.

Valerie Wells (former nurse who worked for an ENT surgeon.)
http://bebabe.wordpress.com/
http://www.beforhorn.blogspot.com/

Good points Valerie! I agree with you that he may be talking about fibromas instead of Calluses. I love your point about your professional friend still using "Foundations for Superior Performance". I have heard several top notch Horn experts talk about "begining Horn" and unlike some other instrumentalists us brass players really do have to start from the begining each and every day. Foundations, warm ups, scales, all the basics need to be reviewed by us every day we practice and play.

I only object to one point, ". .Colson's obviously had some experience with one or more players who never recovered after wearing braces due to changes in their mouth." I don't think it is obvious; there is the possibility they were doing something wrong. I picked up a new student last night who happens to have braces. She sounded not very good when I showed up. 45 minutes later she has a great tone and her range is now A above thw treble clef and B 2nd line bass clef.

It's not the braces, it's not the shape of the teeth, it's not the tongue piercing, it's not any dental appliance. It's proper embouchure and embouchure development. I personally don't allow my students to use gimmicks or aides. Horn playing is a natural process, using these crutches only hinders the students and develops bad habits. (ex: wax on the braces to prevent cutting the lip does not keep the student from using too much pressure it allows for the bad habit to continue.)

Regardless of appliances and gadgets Colson does use a number of exercises that I also use. I believe we have both gotten them from the same teachers. The exercises in the book are great and well thought out. So I do suggest the book on that account.

One of my friends has a rare condition (unfortunately it has a very long and hard to remember name that I can't recall) that causes her lips to be sort of... constantly swollen.
I believe it's not painful, just inconvenient.
Anyway, she has recently shown in interest in playing a brass instrument (she is an extremely talented woodwind player) but cannot make a sound.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Would it happen to be Melkersson-Rosenthal Syndrome? Just a guess.
With brass playing your mind and body get used to making a sound by buzzing a small area of the lips. It becomes a 'learned' process. With the lip changing constantly it would be very difficult to learn how to buzz correctly for each pitch. This would be especially difficult on French Horn. As the smaller mouthpiece leaves little room for error. This is not to say it can't be done though.

What your friend would need to do is learn to play with an 'einsetzen' style embouchure. She should think about buzzing with only the fleshy center part of the lips. If she trie to fit her lips into the mouthpiece this will change radically every time her lips change size. Setting the mouthpiece on the inner flesh will allow for change in lip size.

I would recoommend just gettign any note out of the horn for a while. Don't worry about fingerings or anything just get used to getting some buzzing going, lower notes will be best. As these notes become easier to do and consistent then move on to the scales etc.

HAH! I was going to suggest just the opposite -- a rolled-in ansetzen type embouchure! Players with very full lips often find success with that type of set up. However, I don't know her personal architecture full or thin ... and there's really no way to predict what would work even if it did! Whatever she does, it's going to take a lot of experimentation to find something that works.

Please share a link to my blog with her. BE offers lots of opportunity for experimenting with extreme embouchure set ups & lip shapes so the player can discover what works best for them as an individual. If anything can help her, I believe it would be The Balanced Embouchure.

Valerie Wells
http://bebabe.wordpress.com/
http://www.beforhorn.blogspot.com/

Valerie I thought about Ansetzen also, but since the lip is in constant flux an Ansetzen would constantly change the amount of lip rolled inside. So I'm thinking Einsetzen would be better and more consistent day to day regardless of the swelling.

You're probably right, John. Ansetzen takes quite a while to develop into a flexible functioning set up... at least it did for me. But I love it for endurance and consistent tone throughout the registers. But, IMHO, einsetzen is more intuitive and better suited to many horn players.

Check out Steve Park's chops. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2J9cvNRs1U He's the one that inspired me to work on developing ansetzen.

I'd sure appreciate hearing back about this gal. I'd like to find out how she progresses with this swollen lip condition.

Valerie Wells
http://bebabe.wordpress.com/
http://www.beforhorn.blogspot.com/

I might get braces for a terrible cross bite. So from reading this post it probobly won't effect my playing after a few days. But my question is i would take the bands that connect my upper and lower jaw right?

There are so many different type of crossbites that the type of braces, or other dental apparatus and the manner of connections vary greatly. Feel free to ask your orthodondist any questions you have; they really don't mind answering questions.