Flutes and surgery/braces...

[LotsOfBalloons]

So...

How long after a dental op does Teenchild have to sat off flute?

Also any hints for adjusting with braces? She needs them tightening every 6 weeks or so once on- will that affect her playing too?

She's working towards grade 7 and has a fairly long lesson every week....

My daughter had braces as a teenager and also a small operation to allow her impacted eye tooth to grow normally. I don’t remember any issues whatsoever. She recently gained a master’s degree with distinction in performance as a flautist so it obviously hasn’t held her back and I’m sure it will be the same for your daughter.

Flute teacher here. Have seen many children with braces over the years, some you barely notice a difference, others really struggle. (Worse one I ever had couldn't get a sound for about 2 weeks...just a month before a sheduled grade 5!) Once they've got used to them the tightening issue is normally that their mouth feels a bit sore anyway rather than it being worsened by the flute. Her flute teacher should be able to advise, working for the higher grades anyway there's plenty of aural skill to be practised to break up the lesson a bit and give breaks if needed. If it does turn out to be a real problem for a while, it doesn't need to hold her back, just skip grade 7, keep progressing and do the 8 when everything has settled down.

Thanks ever so much both of you.

Yes she will be sort of skipping grade 7 in that she's doing the work with her teacher and then moving onto grade 8 without sitting the exam - but I think she only has a couple of grade 7 pieces so far/they're not onto grade 8 yet. But yes at least there isn't an exam imminent!

She has an hour lesson with roughly 2/3 flute and 1/3 piano (she's not great at piano, it's more for fun so it's sort of morphed from 50/50 to this) but she could do piano in her lesson if needed.

She has orchestras and all the rest of it too but I think performances are end of summer term.

Thanks

My flautist DD had her braces for four years and two extractions in that time. There were never any problems with playing or lessons. An ibuprofen an hour before the tightening will help with pain.

Fantastic! And good tip about the ibuprofen too. As it's all in her mouth I'd started to get anxious!