Hello all, I have recently kicked this habit of mine, and although it has been only a matter of days, I feel confident that I am finally quitting.
.. Which made me curious. How many smokers do we have out there? Do you think it interferes with your playing?
Smoking has always bothered me as a harp player, regardless of seeing Jason Ricci or all those Mississippi guys smoke like chimneys and still do their magic at the instrument.
Best of luck but wouldn't you just love one more nice tasty dose? You know that great feeling you get when you inhale and the blow out that warm white smoke. especially on a cool morning like this when you can blow out so much smoke that you amaze yourself. Ah a nice Marlboro light or a Kool maybe, or even a Newport just to get totally into the spirit of the blues. Greetings from Tobacco Road ---------- My YouTube Channel
I celebrated 2 years no butts in november. I started exercising and eating better too. I haven't been sick or caught a cold since. I've only been playing harp for 1 year, so I don't have a before and after story. I definately feel more healthy.
My advise to anyone trying to quit is to try Tea Tree Toothpicks. You can get them at any health food store. It helps with the oral fixation. I did it, good luck.
I also think taking up a pipe helps. I used to smoke a pipe, but quit a few years ago. Never had any trouble setting it down. I still long for it now and again, but I've quit for so long I don't even like the smell of any smoke anymore.
First off Congragulations!! I have never smoked but playing in smoke filled clubs for 30+ years.......... I hate the stuff and it definetely messes with you playing (let alone your health). Europe was the worst. Their cigarettes are stronger and they often have little to no ventilation compared to the states. One club was so bad in Belguim that with the stage lights on me smoke was coming out of my harp like I was a heavy metal act. I ended up having to go outside and puke. I can't tell you how bad it affected my playing. Plus having ones clothes, amps, guitars, harps, reak of the stuff, made touring a real drag. I will never play in a place again that allows smoking. Once you get away from it there is no going back. Even now with the no smoking bans in clubs, most hang around just outside the doors and it all blows back in, or you have to wade through it to get in and out. Good Luck and I hope you never go back! Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " life is a daring adventure or nothing at all" - helen keller
Unfortunitly I started up again 2 years ago after a 9 yr hiatus and definitly notice a difference.I know its "Not Good" and hope to put them down again for good.Just think of how much more harp equip.I could use the $$ for.(1 motivational factor I guess) @MilesDewar;I agree somewhat unless your gigging in front of a crowd and the cotton sets in;It can make for a dry solo and when your in that situation theres not much you can do about it.Although I do enjoy from time to time but have refrained in this particular situation.This and cold meds are a no,no for me before a gig because of this reason.Believe me,I learned from experience.
I stopped smoking 5 yrs ago when I was 30 & it has definitely helped my breathing when playing Harmonica. If you get lung cancer that will affect your harp playing. Stopping smoking is one of the best things I have done but I am only just starting to realise that.
All you have to do is fight the urge for a cig. I have a full length pot on my leg I keeping wanting to itch it but I can't it is the same thing with smoking, the itch like the urge for a fag goes away & then comes back later after a while the urges get less frequent it took me six weeks before the urges stopped. any one can stop if they really want to, you got to way up the pros & cons & then when you get the urge remind yourself of them..
I stopped smoking cigarettes after a puntured lung a year ago. I have fallen off the wagon a couple of times where i've been drunk and had one then felt imense guilt afterwards but generally life is much better without them.
I don't think smoking ever hindered my harp playing that i know of. I could still play for hours only difference is i would stop for a smoke break every half an hour.
I also did a fair amount of exercise when i smoked. It never stopped me from going for a run or from going kickboxing. I noticed the benefit from stopping smoking if i had to do short sprints or bursts of exercise then my breathing felt much easier than when i smoked but going for a jog or doing fairly light exercise i could still do happily when i smoked.
@tolga, im glad you posted this as i also quit just 3 days ago. chantix seems to help, i feel like smoking was keeping me from playing how i want to , and killing me. i think the hard part is not finding a reason/excuse to pick another one up. has been my downfall in the past anyway. GOOD LUCK to you :) ---------- Matt Freshour
I smoke, and not being a non smoker, i cant comment on how it may or may not otherwise affect my play... but i will say this. i can drone out on a jam until im bored with it... dry lips and all, with no problems.
if any of you know deak, he smokes and can blow the candles off yo mommas birthday cake! ---------- Kyzer's Travels Kyzer's Artwork "Music in the soul can be heard by the universe." - Lao Tzu
Congratulations! Quitting smoking is the way to go if you think you want to. I'm certainly glad I seem to have finally quit for the last time a little over 3 yrs ago. Not to mention society, at least in my region, is certainly cracking down on it by raising prices, limiting the places its allowed, even businesses restrict it on their property & charge extra for insurance, etc.
I found the patch very helpful in my quitting and would recommend it to anyone. It separates the physical/mental addiction from the chemical addiction. Of course this alone won't make you quit on its own but it helps.
Obviously, you won't be able to quit unless you 110% want to quit and are committed to it. Having quit over 3 years ago I can tell ya the trials don't completely go away. Occasionally there is a mental want especially, like they say, a smoker is a smoker when the cards/chips are down, lol. This is why the 110% commitment :) .
Far as harmonica play, I didn't start playing harmonica till after I quit smoking but there's a big difference in playing harmonica & going out for a 60 minute straight run. The later I still struggle with and working on building lung endurance to what it should be. Quite frustrating when your legs can go the distance but part way through your lungs are like hell no, lol. But also I assume any smoke contaminants wouldn't help the harmonica itself too.
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~Ryan
"I play the harmonica. The only way I can play is if I get my car going really fast, and stick it out the window." - Stephen Wright
Pennsylvania - H.A.R.P. (Harmonica Association 'Round Philly)
10 years ago I saw Sam Meyers perform. He chain smoked through the first two songs before playing harp on the third song. It didn't seem to affect his playing. He died of throat cancer though. ---------- Ozark Rich __________ ##########
---------- Hi all! I was a smoker for over 40 years , basically a pack a day or , i would smoke up a storm (if i was jamming or playing a gig ).It's been a year since i got the laser treatment, best $300.00 i ever invested .I did find that eventually over time smoking diminished my lung power and capacity when i played .Yet now I have regained some new found lung power since i quit . When i think back , it seems a shame to have messed around with the one main body organ that you need in order to play this instrument , after you have committed years developing your skills.Oh yes , I didn't need any new harps , so i banked approx $3,000.00 last year .And i smell better .Motivation anyone !
I used to smoke real bad. 60 a day plain cigarettes Lucky Strike or Phillip Morris. I also for years smoked a pipe. Although I have been off them now for half my life it has left its mark. My lungs let me down with short bouts of asthma generally as a residual of having a cold. I swim distances 3 to 4 times a week and believe that harp playing is also very beneficial, so mostly I'm ok. But I wished I had never taken it up. Being near others smoking now is something my lungs can't take.
I believe the only way to stop is by going cold turkey. I think one also has to become a hater of the habit. Keep self-reinforcing only dopes smoke and that it's a foul smelling filthy habit. It's also a deadly way of paying much more than your fair share of taxes. I don't mean to be unsympathetic or unkind ie nothing personal as I've been there. It would however be very hypocritical of me to ever start again.
I smoked 60 to 80 cigs a day for over 40 years--cigars, pipe--whatever. I quit at the turn of the century--11 years of not smoking at all. I stopped looking at my smoke meter after a few years--last time I remember seeing it, I had paid for a house (my wife and I quit together, so it added up faster).
I would never go back to it--but sometimes I do miss a good cigar. . . ---------- ==================================== Always be yourself--unless you suck. . . -Joss Whedon
Quit smoking now! I smoked for 30 years with a 5 year quit period in the 80's. Quit again in 2007. NOw get this -- my playing is 5 times better than it was when I smoked. Imagine a guitar player - take a hammer and bang your fingers once a day - that's what smoking is like for a harp player. I have asthma and mild COPD but with diaphragmatic breathing I can play very well. And things get better with time. Quit now bros. My father is 84 and is terminally ill with lung cancer. A few years ago before his diagnosis, he ordered some nicotine gum - he never used it but one day while visiting he mentioned he had some packs and he gave em to me. I used them to stop smoking! Quit now is all I can say and you will see major benefits in your health and your playing WILL improve. Hey if you don't agree you can always start smoking again!!!
"It's also a deadly way of paying much more than your fair share of taxes."
That's the exact reason I quit. A micro, personal tax revolt.
I paid with each increase in prices, which were tax increases not tobacco increases, and paid sales tax on the cost of cigarettes----which were more tax than tobacco.
They went up again, due to the federal governments greed and I said screw it.
I miss it. I love to smoke. I just refuse to pay and pay and pay and pay. I don't get anything out of it and they don't check to make sure the ones that take it deserve it. IE....the welfare wormbag three houses down the road.
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Just when I got a paddle, they added more water to the creek.
A packet of Marlboro reds here in the uk costs about £6.50 which is about $10, that was also another factor in giving up, i can't afford that every day although i do like to smoke a little Cronic every now and then, but i wont use tobacco with it:o) ----------
http://www.youtube.com/user/fiendant?feature=mhum
Last Edited by on Jan 12, 2011 11:54 PM
Quit about 4 years ago.... took up a serious regime of swimming- especially underwater lengths- to get my lungs sorted out. Oddly, didn't really find much difference in my breath holding capacity from smoking me to the non-smoking version. I do, however, have more spare cash, cleaner shirts nad a generally better feeling about my own willpower....
I think there could have been an article somewhere stating that the tar contained in cig smoke actually builds up in the instrument and helps to narrow the gaps in the reed plate resulting in a much tighter better playing harp. ---------- My YouTube Channel
Last Edited by on Jan 13, 2011 5:18 AM
My mother was a smoker when I was a kid, but she quit. Into my mid-twenties, I was a competitive runner (5K to marathon) and wouldn't have thought of smoking. When I started to tour with Sterling Magee and his wife, they were both smokers, and although they cracked the windows of my little Honda when they smoked, that only moderated the smoke. After a while I took up the habit. My then-girlfriend smoked. I got hooked in a low-key way (half a pack a day) and continued that until 2000, when I had a mild heart attack while smoking and playing onstage with Jason Ricci.
Amazingly, I didn't quit for good until November 2003, when I took my final puff. I haven't touched one since then. I started running seriously again in December 2002, ran my first race in April 2003, and it was the manifest insanity of hoping to lower my race times on the one hand and continuing to smoke an occasional cigarette on the other that led me finally to put them down.
I can't say I'm unhappy that I tried them. They're a high, and it's good to know the reason WHY smokers smoke. You'd never know that from the propaganda.
By the same token, they're powerfully addictive. BUT: I've never been seriously tempted since I finally put them down. The cravings went away. I'm no longer "in recovery." Once you decide to stop, and have a clear and convincing reason AND desire to stop, it's not that hard. But the addictive cycle, when you're still using and try to stop for a few days, can convince you that quitting is too hard. It's not.
I don't mind when people around me smoke these days, but that sharp prickling in the nostrils reminds me that when I used to smoke, I barely even noticed the smell of smoke.
There's no way I'd have the stamina that is required to do my one man band thing if I still smoked.
Having smoked and quit, having experienced the full cycle, I'm strongly disinclined to preach--except to say that playing smoke-free clubs is a joy, and I'm glad most clubs in the states are like that now. When I played Mojo in Copenhagen last month, my eyes stung so badly after the second song that I couldn't keep them open. I squinted in pain through the second half of the song.
But on the individual level: it's personal choice. Smoking put me in the intensive care unit of Delray Beach Medical Center and cost me $25,000 out-of-pocket bucks for the angiogram, angioplasty, and the hospital stay. I won't go there again! I'm a happy, healthy runner now.
Last Edited by on Jan 13, 2011 5:11 AM
Interesting thread this. Good story Adam. I was a moderate smoker until 1973 when I got Cancer of the tonsil and understandly quit. Once a smoker though....There are times even now when if things get a bit crazy or after a drinking session that I am still tempted to have a Ciggy and have in fact had a handful over the course of a year. How MAD is that?!!!
I know many guys who have quit, end of story.
I now swim about 5 times a week and have to say that has improved my lung capacity.
KZR: you wrote"I can't say I'm unhappy that I tried them. They're a high, and it's good to know the reason WHY smokers smoke. You'd never know that from the propaganda." You nailed that. You never hear about it but that's the bottom line. Same is true for weed smokers but they are considered criminals and denied job opportunities. Another can of worms entirely. ---------- My YouTube Channel
Just a comment..nothing more. When I quit smoking, Lucky Strikes were 27cents a pack and you put a quarter and a nickle in a cigarette machine and you got back the pack with 3 pennies wedged inside the cellophane wrapper. I never looked back. Thankfully as an old man I don't have any of that cigarette misery to deal with..healthwise or moneywise. Regards
at one time I was a serious runner and once while lining up for a 10k the guy next to me lit up a cigarette-I could not believe it but after the gun went off I never saw the guy again-he left me sitting in the dust
I smoked for over 25 years, probably averaging a pack a day, and quit for good in July 2009; since then I've worked out pretty regularly, so I'm disinclined to lose all that air by taking up the habit again.
The main thing I've noticed is that I can sustain rhythm harp licks like never before, and now I'm having fun parsing out Madcat's stuff (from his DVD), as well as Norton Buffalo's, and also the "rhythm chop" licks taught by my local fave harp player, Phil Wiggins. I just couldn't do that before, as a smoker. It amazes me what some smokers can do on the harp; that warn't me though.
Congrats to those who quit and best wishes to those that are trying. I never smoked but quit the smokeless in a can habit after 17 years....3 cans per day the last 4 years. I went cold turkey New Years Day 11 years ago. I remember being sick, irritable, and gaining weight. Very tough to do. Quitting a nasty tobacco habit not only makes you healthier, the accomplishment makes you feel better about who you are and a new level of self-confidence is gained.
