TuneKey

TuneKey is a new (and ever-improv­ing) app that my stu­dents use to con­firm les­son sched­ules, access record­ings and oth­er resources, log prac­tice ses­sions, eval­u­ate prac­tice habits, and more.  If you haven’t yet installed TuneKey on your device, please scan the QR code with your phone cam­era or click here to down­load the app and get start­ed.  Then just read on for step-by-step instruc­tions for accom­plish­ing each of the fol­low­ing com­mon TuneKey func­tions:

      QR code directing to https://tunekey.app/invite/J56F

      Lessons tab

      Adding an extra lesson

      1. Nav­i­gate to your list of upcom­ing lessons.
      2. Tap “Add Lessons” in the top right of the screen.
      3. At the bot­tom of the screen, tap “Add pri­vate les­son.”
      4. Tap to place a green check mark next to the type of les­son and dura­tion (30- or 60-minute) you’d like to sched­ule, and tap the “Next” but­ton.
      5. Con­firm that “David M. Glas­gow” is checked as instruc­tor and tap Next.
      6. For most lessons, you’ll need to choose “The Per­fect 5th” as a loca­tion. If that loca­tion is not con­ve­nient for you, tap the “Online” radio but­ton instead. Once the cor­rect loca­tion is select­ed, tap “Next.”
      7. Tap “Next” to skip the “Recur­rence” slid­er. (Do not attempt to sched­ule recur­ring lessons in TuneKey! If you are inter­est­ed in recur­ring lessons, I strong­ly rec­om­mend my Sub­scrip­tion plan—please con­tact me to dis­cuss details.)
      8. Con­firm that the details of your request are cor­rect, and tap “Send Con­fir­ma­tion.” I’ll respond, usu­al­ly with­in 24 hours, to con­firm your request or dis­cuss oth­er options.

      Canceling a lesson

      1. Nav­i­gate to your list of upcom­ing lessons.
      2. Tap on the date or time of the les­son you’d like to resched­ule.  (Do NOT tap on the green arrow at the right edge of the screen.)  As long as more than 24 hours remain before the sched­uled start of the les­son, you’ll see links to “Can­cel Les­son” or “Resched­ule.”
      3. Tap “Can­cel Les­son.”
      4. Tap “I’m sure.”

      Registering for a masterclass

      1. Nav­i­gate to your list of upcom­ing lessons.
      2. Tap “Add Lessons” in the top right of the screen.
      3. Tap “Join group les­son.”
      4. Locate the class you wish to join in the list that appears, and tap it to mark it with a green check.
      5. Tap “Next.”
      6. Con­firm that the details dis­played match the class you want to join, and tap “Join In.”
      7. The class should now appear in your list of upcom­ing lessons.

      Rescheduling a lesson

      1. Nav­i­gate to your list of upcom­ing lessons.
      2. Tap on the date or time of the les­son you’d like to resched­ule.  (Do NOT tap on the green arrow at the right of the screen.)  As long as more than 24 hours remain before the sched­uled start of the les­son, you’ll see links to “Can­cel Les­son” or “Resched­ule.”
      3. Tap “Resched­ule.”
      4. Use the cal­en­dar that appears to nav­i­gate to the date to which you’d like to resched­ule the les­son and tap that day num­ber.
      5. You will prob­a­bly need to scroll down a bit to see the “Con­ve­nient Times” that are avail­able on your select­ed date.
      6. Tap on the time slot to which you’d like to resched­ule.
      7. Tap the green “Send Request” but­ton. TuneKey will noti­fy me of your request and I’ll respond to con­firm or request anoth­er alter­na­tive as prompt­ly as pos­si­ble.

      Viewing your schedule

      1. In the top-right cor­ner of the Lessons tab you’ll see a link labeled “Upcom­ing.” Tap that link.
      2. You’ll now see a list of all upcom­ing lessons.

      Materials tab

      The Mate­ri­als tab shows you the audio, video, and print­able resources that I’ve made avail­able to you.  The first time you access this tab, I strong­ly rec­om­mend you do the fol­low­ing:

      1. Tap the Set­tings icon in the top right.  (It’s three ver­ti­cal lines with dots on them, a graph­ic rep­re­sen­ta­tion of an audio mix­er board.)
      2. Set “Apply to” to “All fold­ers.”
      3. Set “View” to “List view.”
      4. Set “Sort” to “File name.”
      5. Set “Order” to “Ascend­ing.”
      6. Turn Group­ing OFF.
      7. Tap the “back” arrow in the top left cor­ner.

      You are, of course, wel­come to adjust these set­tings to your own per­son­al pref­er­ences as you work more with TuneKey, but I find that these set­tings are the most intu­itive for new users.

      Accessing materials

      In the Mate­ri­als tab, you’ll find a fold­er for each title you’re work­ing on with me.  Most such fold­ers will include a PDF of the charts for the piece, along with two audio files—an “accom­pa­ni­ment” or “piano only” track, and a “teach­ing track” that includes the accom­pa­ni­ment plus a wind instru­ment play­ing the vocal melody line to assist with notes and rhythms.  Nav­i­gat­ing the Mate­ri­als tab is fair­ly intu­itive: To view the con­tents of a fold­er or file, sim­ply tap on it.

      If you’d like to down­load a file to your device, you can do that by tap­ping the “Share” icon (a grey circle contains an image of a box with an arrow emerging from it).  Note that audio files can­not yet be downloaded—if you need to down­load an audio file, let me know.

      The Resource Library

      One very spe­cial fold­er in the Mate­ri­als tab is the Resource Library, which includes resources I’ve cre­at­ed and curat­ed from across the web, that I find use­ful for stu­dents who want to dig a lit­tle deep­er into their work (or just have fun “geek­ing out”!).  I often share spe­cif­ic items from this Library with stu­dents as part of their les­son notes, but I encour­age you to explore the con­tents of this fold­er and see what piques your inter­est!

      The Materials tab of the TuneKey app

      Practice tab

      Logging practice time

      1. Go to the Prac­tice tab.
      2. If you are log­ging prac­tice that hap­pened today, tap the “Log” but­ton.
        • If you are log­ging prac­tice that hap­pened before today, tap the “Log for pre­vi­ous days” link, then tap the date of the prac­tice ses­sion you’re record­ing and click “Con­firm.”
      3. Tap “Add Piece.”
      4. Enter the title of the piece you worked on (or any oth­er descrip­tion that you’ll find help­ful when you review your prac­tice his­to­ry).
      5. Tap “Add Min­utes.”
      6. Enter the num­ber of min­utes you spent work­ing on this par­tic­u­lar item.
      7. Tap “Con­firm.”
      8. Your prac­tice ses­sion should now appear on the Log Sheet.

      Recording audio or video

      1. On the Prac­tice tab, tap “Record Prac­tice.”
      2. Tap either “Audio Record­ing” or “Video Record­ing.”
      3. Tap “Add Piece.”
      4. Enter a title for the record­ing.
      5. Tap “Get Start­ed.”
        • Your device may request per­mis­sion to access your micro­phone and/or cam­era.  You’ll need to grant this per­mis­sion in order to make record­ings.
      6. Record­ing will start.
      7. When you fin­ish record­ing, TuneKey will give you a chance to:
        • review it (play arrow)
        • share or down­load it ()
        • upload it for my review ()
        • delete it ()
      8. Com­plet­ed record­ings will appear in your Log Sheet.

      Using the TuneKey metronome

      1. At the top of the Prac­tice tab, tap “Metronome.”
      2. Tap the square but­ton on the left (it defaults to “4/4” to set the time sig­na­ture.
      3. Tap the “Note” but­ton to sub­di­vide the beat into 1, 2, 3, or 4 sub­di­vi­sions.  (Each tap advances to the next sub­di­vi­sion option.)
      4. Tap the “Speak­er” but­ton to select a sound set:
        • elec­tron­ic (speaker)
        • per­cus­sion (cowbell)
        • metronome (metronome)
        • wood blocks (woodblock)
      5. Scroll the cen­ter wheel clock­wise or counter-clock­wise to set the tem­po.
      6. Tap the cen­ter wheel to start and stop the metronome.

      Insight tab

      The Insights tab allows you to view your prac­tice habits over any peri­od of time you select.  Sim­ply tap the cal­en­dar in the top-right cor­ner to adjust the frame of ref­er­ence.

      (There’s also a “Mile­stones” tab that will show you any awards I may have giv­en you dur­ing that time peri­od, though I con­fess I’m not great at remem­ber­ing to give stu­dents TuneKey awards.… 😬)

      Profile tab

      App notifications

      If you would like your phone to noti­fy you when I share a file with you, to remind you of upcom­ing lessons—or even to remind you to get some prac­tice time in!—you may do that in your TuneKey set­tings.  Just vis­it the Pro­file tab, then scroll down a bit to turn on as many noti­fi­ca­tions and reminders as you’d like!