Play it again, YouTube

If you are still on the lookout for a guitar or a piano tutor, here’s where you will get one for free.

Khyati Tharwani is a software professional who was looking for a guitar tutor. Click! She found one on YouTube! The popular video-sharing website seems to be the answer to many a question. Simply type in, ‘how to play guitar’, or ‘how to play the piano’ and you will find thousands of videos uploaded. These videos are for free and teach you how to play instruments.

Sample this. There are about 49,000 videos on YouTube that teach you how to play a guitar and the first video in the list itself has had 3,80,412 hits so far. There are 29,700 videos that teach how to play drums out of which the first video was viewed 6,95,133 times. “I have been learning from this site for about six months now. Thanks to Google through which I got to know about it. I searched ‘How to play Every breath you take’ and boom! YouTube videos descended from heaven! It is quite helpful,” says Rishi Verma, an advertising professional from Mumbai.

Not only the drums or guitar but you can also learn playing instruments like the piano, tabla, harmonica and sitar. The posts on the site teach melody instruments note by note, while the percussion ones are explained in detail beat-wise. Most of these tutorials teach you to play western instruments but there are Indians too who have posted videos that teach quite a bit about Hindustani classical music—instrumental and vocal. Such posts help create interest and the student can take such tutions at personal convenience.

But, experts don’t think much of this initiative. Hear tabla maestro Pandit Suresh Talwalkar, “Such posts may not be of much help to the students as a live teacher-student interaction has no substitute. A guru guides the students in a way no website can. In addition, the foundation is important, you cannot try and build it through a site. Such websites will put the student in the habit of emulating which is not so good for any musician.”

Abhijeet Pohankar, the renowned composer and classical instrumentalist (he plays the electronic synthesiser in santoor style), though has a different view. He says, “YouTube is very helpful for music lovers as it gives you access to world music. Such posts that teach you how to learn an instrument are good for beginners at least if not for advance learners. Students can get some guidance for sure through such videos.”

Connoisseurs and amateurs both have mixed views but the fact that one can take free lessons to learn how to play one’s favourite instrument is music to the ears.