This is Stephen Tobolowsky, sharing some of my experiences with tonebase Piano. And I think I can say without doubt tonebase is the best thing that's happened since the beginning of the pandemic. And I never would have found tonebase if it weren't for the pandemic!

And here’s a brief history of me and music. I fell in love with the piano when I was 8 years old, listening to a fellow classmate of mine, Claire Richards, playing “Pickin’ Up Paw Paw's, Put ‘Em In Your Pocket” in music class. I started taking piano lessons when I was 9 years old, in hopes of one day learning “Pickin’ Up Paw Paw's.” I've been taking piano for the next 60 years! 60 years still can’t play “Pickin’ Up Paw Paw's.” But then the pandemic came, and my current piano teacher — wonderful teacher — could no longer come to my house, ‘cause the virus, don’t ya know.

So I’m going on the computer, and I see tonebase. And I think “well, this may work till the real thing comes along.” tonebase is the most wonderful world opening up to me, with the piano, with creativity in the method of teaching…it is the best thing I found for me and the piano.

I consider myself sort of an intermediate pianist at this point in time. I know one of the questions was who is tonebase good for. Certainly any beginner, intermediate, advanced, even super advanced can get something out of it. And there are a lot of reasons for this.

The approach tonebase has — there are a lot of technical lessons, if you want to pick up some of the basics, lessons on scales and fingering, how to play arpeggios better, trills parallel thirds, parallel sixths, some of the tricky things — you have technical lessons.

And then you have dozens of individual pieces being taught to you by some of the greatest teachers and pianists in the world! And the great thing about it is, it's not live…it's on video, so when you're taking a piano lesson on a Mozart or Beethoven Sonata, a Chopin Nocturne…you can go back and watch it at any point in time, and see where you're messing up!

Not only that, you have the ability on tonebase to download the teacher’s score with their notes on them. So this is the problem with taking lessons from a live, is that I kept forgetting things that my teacher would tell me. With tonebase, you never forget. All you have to do is hit that rewind button.

It's the most fun I have — right now I'm working on The Tempest and finally my wife was cooking the other day, and she came and she said “Steven, I’m able to hear the music!” The greatest compliment I ever got. Maybe someday I'll play “Pickin’ Up Paw Paw's.” but what I got from my wife is worth its weight in gold. Thank you tonebase, love the lessons…keep ‘em coming.