SAN GERONIMO, Calif. — Talc Tolchin ducks into the music studio he built behind his Marin County cottage, where the sun filters through a towering redwood tree and his daughter has dotted the flower beds with fairy houses. It's time for his next piano lesson.
An hour's drive northwest of San Francisco, this woodsy town tucked among rolling golden hills claims only 500 or so dispersed residents. But not all of Tolchin's students are close by. When it's time to greet his second student on a recent Friday, he reaches for the laptop perched on his upright piano and summons her — via Skype.
Madeline Sheron pops up, peering at Tolchin from under her dark bangs. They banter — about an app that offers piano, bass and drum accompaniment, adjusted for groove and tempo. Then they dive into "All of Me," the song Sheron had chosen in hopes of mastering jazz improvisation.
Her computer camera is aimed over her shoulder and Tolchin watches her left hand as it bops from sevenths to thirds. Tolchin has two cameras — one mounted on the ceiling so students can watch his hands, the other trained on his face.
"Go, girl!" he exclaims, tapping his foot as she masters the first turnaround.
Sheron was 200 miles away, in the Sierra Nevada ski town of Truckee. But she could just as well have been across the globe.
This is a music lesson, 2013-style, with tailored software, a growing array of videoconferencing platforms and, for Tolchin, a powerful cable Internet connection that on this day allowed him and Sheron to play their pianos simultaneously — with no delay.
It's not for everyone. The world of music instructors is filled with late technology adopters on such tight budgets that even basic equipment needed to conduct online lessons is a stretch, said Rachel Kramer, director of member development for the Cincinnati-based Music Teachers National Assn.
Then there's tradition. "There will be always be teachers who feel it would never ever work," she said.
But plenty are plunging in. Kramer rattled off examples: the saxophone teacher who plies his trade at schools during free periods and resorts to online lessons with those students during snow days. The pianist who spends months with her grandchild in California and has managed to hang on to many students remotely.
For the enthused, she said, "it's a philosophy: 'This can work.'"
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An accomplished musician, Tolchin began examining new ways of teaching more than a quarter-century ago, when he produced one of the first series of instructional videos on the market. In time, he shifted to DVD, but competition coupled with free YouTube tutorials eventually slowed sales.
Next, the hippie-era New York transplant with wispy gray hair tried phone lessons. It worked for him, "but the students needed to see my fingers." Two years ago, he gussied up his computer setup.
Tolchin, 66, describes himself as "a facilitator, a coach, a trainer, sometimes a parent, sometimes a therapist."
He allows students to choose their music and guides them with intimacy, at their own pace. He promises a mix of "patient disciplining" combined with plenty of acknowledgment and enthusiasm. He loves guiding those with a passion for it into the realm of songwriting.
To him, teaching remotely doesn't change much.
"When you see someone's face, you see their doubt or their excitement," he said. "It's really about the person and the issues they have around performance, being accepted, worrying about being reprimanded. What I really do is develop a relationship."
All but one of his online students have been adults. One tuned in from northern Canada, where Tolchin couldn't help asking about frigid weather conditions. His long-term dream: to accrue enough remote students to one day move to Bali and teach from there.
Tolchin charges $50 per lesson, whether students show up in person or on screen. Most of his students come via personal referral, though he has also drawn some interest through his website. Of his 17 current students, however, only three study remotely.
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