Tunefox

Tldr, despite my first paragraph, Tunefox is excellent if you have foundations from elsewhere. I got Tunefox a while back when I began banjo with virtually no music foundation. It was not the most helpful of foundational lessons. So many things I didn’t understand that the lessons lack (learning is a personal thing, so I won’t take a star for that - it may be excellent for others), so it didn’t work well for me then. A bit later after going through lessons from different internet instructors and really getting almost all of the fundamentals down, I had a problem with figuring out tempo and getting my songs to sound like music rather than methodical picking. It’s something that recorded non-personalized lessons will lack, and I found it hard as heck to learn just by recordings and blogs. THIS is where Tunefox is really shining for me. Cripple Creek is such an identifiable and “easy” melody to play in the beginner banjo realm, but beyond that I had a tough time getting melody in songs like Old Joe Clark and the other basics. In just 30 minutes (it that) in Tunefox, I was finally able to get my tempo fixed up and the melody is finally really shining, and now it’s such a fun song to play. I’d assume it’s still no replacement for a good old fashioned human instructor, but it’s the best for the things recorded lessons or static tablature can’t teach that I’ve experienced. It’s a very simple app to navigate and extremely clean. There’s a bunch of settings and ways to use it to just practice individual measures, progressively speed up, hide notations (to help with memorization), different versions, and other good tools for practicing what you know.

As someone who hasn’t played music in several years this app was a perfect way for me to hit the ground running with learning the banjo. After a month of working through the lessons I am feeling more confident in my ability to start playing with a group. The support for this app is top notch. I have mad suggestion to them through email and Facebook and have had great response time and friendly service. They have even implemented one of my suggestions already. There seems to be an active development staff and the Facebook group has been very helpful. The value for the subscription is great when compared to lessons or other online instruction. If you’re thinking about learning a new instrument or just learning bluegrass TuneFox is amazing.

I’ve been an early user of TuneFox and love the new app and the ease with which I can learn new songs, either solely by ear or with some of the tools (ease of isolating measures, hidden notes, ability to switch in different licks, Scruggs/melodic and backup playing styles). With TuneFox, I’ve stretched myself like never before, and it’s all self-paced. When i’ve got a tune I want to master, as happened this week at a jam session, TuneFox was my first stop. I love being able to isolate one, two three measures until I have them nailed and then move on. In the past, I’ve always started at the beginning of a song and as a result, i don’t get to the back of the song as much. That’s all changed and I am seeing progress I’ve never seen before! I’m now using it for mandolin and plan on using it to learn guitar.