Aug-23-05 3:13am  [ re: didj3 ]

Will the swelling go away? Yes and No!

Yes the swelling will go away when it dries out. But if you play it for long periods at a time it will swell again. Even if you play it for short periods you'll get a certain amount of swelling. The longer you play it the more it will swell up.

The big problem is after awhile from all the swelling and contracting the wood may crack, but that would take a lot of use to do that.
Wood is some funny stuff, let it dry out to much it will crack, get it to wet it will swell and split. If you have a problem with to much moisture and play for long periods of time, and want to stick to harps with wooden combs. I'd suggest having two or three harps of the same key so you can switch harps well your playing as they get to wet.

When I used to play Blues harps I always carried two harps just because of this. Thank God Hohner started using plastic. It makes a much better harp.

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BillyRay