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YouTube Virtuosos (Old Man Rant)

#42
socialleper said:
Interesting.
It kinda sounds like this guy and Jered Dines were already recording engineers and had all this equipment around already. The explains part of it. The amount of stuff you would need to make this all work is a lot to dump just on YouTube videos, but all they had to do it add a camera.
Sadly it seems like their videos are more popular than their own bands. There are a few pedal makers out there that have to pay for their music career with their pedal making. Goes to show how little being a musician pays these days.
Dines is a pretty talented musician. I'm wondering if he isn't a more "successful" musician because he doesn't want to be. Touring is a major pain and not very profitable. Scallon may be the same way. Interesting.
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Jared Dines is the frontman of his own band already, so I assume he started YouTube on the side based on his own experiences and all.
 
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#43
TheBassWizard1 said:
I can't speak for everyone else who makes YouTube videos, but I personally do both. I tour with a lot of pop artists, have an awesome career as a touring musician in LA (Just played to 10,000 people on NYE with a Disney Star in Hershey, PA) and also make YouTube videos when I am in town (and sometimes on the road).

YouTube allows me to express myself in ways that I can't on my usual gigs (like playing solo bass arrangements), and it allows me to connect with and help many bass players around the world.

I love playing live and would never give that up. After all, that's what got me into music. However, YouTube provides an equally rewarding experience and I've gotten emails from people telling me how my videos got them excited about picking up their bass again, or how it inspired them to start playing bass in the first place. This is highly rewarding and motivating to me, and knowing that there are people out there getting value out of my videos pushes me to keep making them and sharing my knowledge with this vast and awesome bass playing community :)
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callofcthulhu said:
Here, knock yourself out.

Invalid Link Removed

Pick your favorite "virtuoso" and amend /user/[their username] to the URL, e.g. Invalid Link Removed

As already mentioned, this estimates revenue from ad traffic only - endorsements, merch, album sales, sponsorships, patreon, paypal donations, kickstarters etc. are all on top of this.
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Invalid Link Removed
 
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#44
socialleper said:
My question is why? I make the occasional gear demo, post live performances fans shot, share clips of things that won't work with a band on SoundCloud for giggles; but that is all secondary to my work as a performing musician. That doesn't seem to be these peoples' goal. This is their career. But isn't that an awful lot of work for nothing? I've never heard of a YouTube musician getting discovered and joining a band.
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Look up Anna Graceman. She was discovered by Ellen DeGeneres and performed on her show. She also landed fourth place overall on America's Got Talent. All by YouTube uploads of herself singing and playing piano.

I had the joy of working with her on her first band album in Juneau, AK back in 2010. What a talented young lady, and a real sweetheart!

Here's a link to one video of us in the studio. I'm playing a Schecter Stiletto Custom 6 6-string bass on this track. I was about 18 or so and still a senior in high school. To this day, she still writes and records. Even plays venues like the Palazzo, so I hear!

 
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#45
Long time YouTuber here. The point is that musicians who make original content can "monetize" their videos, aka putting ads on it. Than they get a set quantity of money depending on their views. They can actually make a living out of it, but that takes a lot of dedication: getting thousands of people to keep on whatching your videos is quite hard.
I know of a gamer I whatch on YT, who's got a wife and a son, house car and all: he managed to leave his day job and keeps up his family with his gaming YT videos.
Ever heard of PewDiePie? Millions of dollars he made.
As for me, I've only been putting up covers and my channel is just for fun. YT never came before "real" playing or bands. Covers cannot be monetized because YT will recognize copyrighted material instantly and put ads on it. So my videos are pretty much having right owners gain few dollars, heh. I should get a thanks letter from Reprise Records.
 
#46
The record industry pretty much died.
The rest of the music industry is severely injured and trying to hold on.

People just don't value music as much as they used to.
Bars simply don't need live music when people are just as happy with a jukebox or DJ.

Still, that doesn't stop creative people from doing what they love. There will always be music
And as long as there is music, musicians will search for an audience.

My question though...
Is the number of YouTube artists, online lessons and video games that teach you to play guitar
feeding in to the notion that anyone can do it and musicianship is nothing special and not really
worth valuing anymore?
 
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#47
I really like Fluff's videos. I always assumed a majority of YouTube personalities just wanted to make the stuff they would want to see. Kind of like old public access tv.
Jayhawk said:
There are all kinds of levels of YouTube musicians and, yes, some make a decent living at it. Here's a link to an FAQ video by Ryan Bruce (aka Fluff) that talks about the financial side of things and why he does the YouTube thing:



Like Fluff's channel, most of the time channels that have any success are more than just cover songs and usually include something either more informative or entertaining to keep people coming back. Successful channels can not only make money but get actual gear endorsements. Like most "passions," doing a YouTube Channel isn't as much about making money as doing something you enjoy and sharing it with others you hope with enjoy it and/or find it useful as well.
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#48
Alot of youtube players just floor me with how good they are. There are quiet a few awesome ones out there.
But,for me, I'm always more impressed with a bass player that is jamming with an actual drummer.
There's just a dynamic involved that isn't replicated by a drum machine.

I would like to see more of the youtube bass players jamming with real drummers.
 
#52
TheBassWizard1 said:
I can't speak for everyone else who makes YouTube videos, but I personally do both. I tour with a lot of pop artists, have an awesome career as a touring musician in LA (Just played to 10,000 people on NYE with a Disney Star in Hershey, PA) and also make YouTube videos when I am in town (and sometimes on the road).

YouTube allows me to express myself in ways that I can't on my usual gigs (like playing solo bass arrangements), and it allows me to connect with and help many bass players around the world.

I love playing live and would never give that up. After all, that's what got me into music. However, YouTube provides an equally rewarding experience and I've gotten emails from people telling me how my videos got them excited about picking up their bass again, or how it inspired them to start playing bass in the first place. This is highly rewarding and motivating to me, and knowing that there are people out there getting value out of my videos pushes me to keep making them and sharing my knowledge with this vast and awesome bass playing community :)
Click to expand...
You're videos are good. I've been watching them for quite some time.
 
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#54
Nev375 said:
My question though...
Is the number of YouTube artists, online lessons and video games that teach you to play guitar
feeding in to the notion that anyone can do it and musicianship is nothing special and not really
worth valuing anymore?
Click to expand...
I don't think this is the case, but I do think it can be an inspiration for others to follow. I was encouraged to upload videos to Youtube by someone that was doing it and I learned a lot in the process. Learning to record is a process in and of itself. Having the confidence to put yourself out there is scary. I found that by knowing that I'm going to upload a YT vid makes me pratice more to get it as right as I can because you want to do the best you can. Creativity comes in many forms and can hit you at any time.

Gregg Johnson
 
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#55
I have purchased several albums, after previewing or even completely listening to them, on youtube. Or subsequently, Bandcamp (where you often make the actual purchase, if we are talking about indie bands or DIY unsigned musicians).
 
#56
I'm not defending either side to avoid the conflict but just my opinion:
For it:
- My step-Dad is a Youtuber (playing video games, not music) and he makes a decent income (better than most $20 per hour jobs) and he gets to go to all sorts of Events and gets games before their release dates and gets paid to play them. While this isn't related to music, games are his passion so one could see how this relates to music. A lot of those guys get effects pedals, signature instruments, and get to go to Music Showcases just from being big on Youtube. Arguably the best part, is when you get to making more than your day job you could quit your day job if you wanted.
- Personally, the more I play with bands around town the more I just want to play music by myself. Way too many *ssholes out there that expect perfection when they can't even remember the songs they wrote (that's a story for another time). Honestly, I wouldn't mind having my own little studio and tracking all the instruments myself. We play music because we enjoy it and it's supposed to be fun. Everyone has a different view on what's fun. I'm far from the best drummer in town but I owned a set for two years. I played a lot and gigged. I'd rather lay my own tracks than have some "wannabe John Bonham" come and beat the living hell out of my drumset. That's just me.

Against it:
- I once was in a band with a guy who was a "bedroom musician" before Youtube was a big thing. He was and still is one of the worst musicians I know. (I really do hate to talk about someone like that but I'll leave him nameless). He had no concept of timing or chord progressions. He would tell us a song is a basic 12-bar blues and then break the progression whenever he felt like it. He had these problems because he grew up playing with just himself so he had no idea the things he was doing were wrong. I will admit, in his most recent band he is getting better but he's still far away from us "weekend warriors" who grew up playing in bands.
 
#57
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#59
I haven't seen much here on the point that being on YouTube is somehow anti social. I think it's the opposite in a lot of ways. You are connecting with (hopefully) a ton of people through comments, an offshoot website, product or service, FB or through exposure for a band, real life events, books etc etc. That is the definition of connecting to people. To do it effectively you have to be social.

In ye olden days you had to be at an event in one place and one time and this was not a gaurentee that a fan could actually interact with anyone in a band.

So compare the social aspect of being in a room with bandmates vs connecting with 100s or 1000s of fans that can find your channel and interact at anytime from whereever they are.

Not anti social.
 
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#60
pedroims said:
There are good examples of bass players that had been beneficed by YouTube: Marlowedk, Anna Sentina, Marta Altesa, DavidSinRocks, etc. My workmate's nephew is the guy from prankvsprank, he makes good money (1.3 millions according to this website: The 25 Highest Earning Youtube Stars )

You can get an overview on how make money in youtube:

YouTube Partner program overview - YouTube Help

Get Started - YouTube
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Let your workmate know we're all sorry for their lost (Jesse's mom):( I'm a peep for life saan
 

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