Every day I discover new advantages to being a pianist.

And now I know why violinists wear gloves at fancy parties. 

The worst problem I had with music training was that the bands and marching snare drums were too loud for my hearing. I had to wear earplugs - it was embarrassing.

French horn: marching with the concert horn is awkward and even worse on the arms than using the marching horn, which has a gigantic bell that's impossible to see around, leading you to droop the horn (which is harder on your back in the long run), which leads to the band director getting mad at you. Yay!

But not blisters so...

Fishers - that's actually not embarrassing at all. Lots of orchestral and symphonic musicians pay hundreds of dollars on special earplugs that are designed to block out just the correct amount of sound without compromising listening ability, and marching bands are even louder.

Anyways, I happen to play string bass as well. I picked it up just three years ago, but I've been playing flute for almost nine years.

Regarding the blisters, I know you said that calluses form, but could it be that you never take a long enough break from playing for them to properly develop? And like you say, strings could be the other major factor. My high school's bass had these awful strings and I got blisters quite frequently, but since buying my own bass with obviously better strings it's been much less painful. They're D'Addario Helicore.

-L

Yeah, I'm careful to take the advice I've received from teachers and friends alike to heart - play just until the point you know the blisters will form, and then take a break, moisturize your hands, let the calluses build up. Problem is, as I see when my hands get wet enough, my calluses, when they do finally form, start getting torn apart.

I use D'Addario Helicore Orchestrals on the primary bass I play (rented from my high school), right now - before I was using the hybrids, and I still have those for a backup set. On the other bass I play over with a college jazz band (same college I'll be going to next year), they've actually got old Lycons (well, with a helicore hybrid D; luthier that they sent it to recently decided that the Lycon D was about to break so he replaced the string) that are about 40 years old on it, because they really stocked up on those strings way back when. Those are absolutely wonderful strings, and the tension is nice and light, but sometimes it still feels like too much, and still feels too harsh on my hands, even with the set-up as forgiving as you can get it (on a nice Eastman VB-350, too). But I've played on synthetic core strings and gut strings before and they were just so much easier on my hands, and just felt better.

Not to say I'm too horribly annoyed with the blisters. Over the years I've just gotten used to playing through them when I have to, just because I can't always have the opportunity to stop. They've just been a necessary evil for me. So when my index finger decides to pop open on the opening solo I have to the jazz version of the Nutcracker Suite while my middle finger has a ridiculous blood blister on it all because of how hard I had to go at it playing Shiny Stockings, three songs earlier, while I'm at a relatively important gig...I play through the pain and fix it when I get home. Maybe I should just start dipping my fingers in super glue before I play.

But yeah, I'm fairly certain it's the strings. I do everything in my power to take care of my hands so that this doesn't happen, and so far it's always happened, so the only conclusion I really can come to is the strings by now, and a teacher of mine agrees. I'll be trying some really low-tension string alternatives (downtuned spiro solos, at least E and A because that's what I've got coming in) to see if that might help, and if not, it's off to the soft world of synthetic and organic strings for me.

Yay, high costs.

Hey, we aren't playing viola, I'm happy about that, they get this and being made fun of every day. 

(also I hate the fact that playing progressively smaller clarinets and higher notes (as in, about E above the E above the treble clef. =P) is slowly destroying my lower lip's surface)