I find that water with a bit of sugar or honey dissolved in it works for me.
In extreme dry situations, I find a portable steamer (the kind designed for steaming one's face or sinuses) is a great help. I have yet to find one of these that runs on batteries, however - I've always wanted one I could use on an airplane, where I usually resort to drinking tons of water, and keeping a moist washrag with me and breathing through it periodically.
Use glycerin-based lozenges such as Grether's Black Currant Pastilles or Pine Brothers Honey lozenges - look for glycerine in the ingredients of whatever lozenge you choose. If you've actually got inflamed mucuous membranes, you might want to consider using lozenges and or tea in which the main ingredient is slippery elm (ulmus fulva), such as Thayer's Slippery Elm Throat Lozenges.
Tablets or syrups in which the main ingredient is Guaifenesin can also help, though these are medicines, and you may not want to go to that extreme.
Don't drink anything with caffeine in it - at all, if your problem is chronic, or at least not during the day that you need to sing.
Take a hot steamy shower whenever you get off a plane, and before you're going to sing.
Consider keeping a humidifier going near your bed, by your desk at work, etc.
You may also want to try a throat spray like Entertainer's Secret or Snore Fix, both of which are designed to keep the back of the throat moist. The latter contains glycerin and water as its main ingredients.
Karen Mercedes http://www.radix.net/~dalila/index.html ________________________________ O music, that openest the abysses of the soul! Thou dost destroy the normal balance of the mind. - Romain Rolland, JEAN-CHRISTOPHE
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