Friday Night YouTube Music #2

A repository of music both old and new

The pandemic forced many changes onto our lives, some negative, sone positive. Certainly quarantines, lockdowns, school closures, and other public health-related mandates created a sense of isolation, adding to the anxieties caused by a slowing economy. But like all crises, some changes also became opportunities: how many Americans began baking bread in 2020, or taking online classes in knitting?

For musicians, particularly those who relied on live performance to earn a living, adaptation often came in the form of recording their music themselves and uploading to an online site, most notably YouTube. A result is that lesser known acts had a platform on which they could gain visibility and a following without touring. And they could do it without a record contract with a major record label. They could record remotely, usually sharing files from software like Apple’s Pro Tools. As a result, we listeners were also given the opportunity to hear music that may have never come to our attention through the usual media. Some bands had been using this path prior to the pandemic, and were in position to take advantage of the circumstances.

The funk bank Vulfpeck is one of these. Formed in 2011 by 4 University of Michigan students-Jack Stratton (keyboards, drums, guitar) Theo Katzman (guitar, drums, vocals) Woody Goss (keyboards, and Joe Dart (bass), eventually supplemented by vocalist Antwaun Stanley, Joey Dosik (saxophone, keyboards, vocals) and funk guitarist extraordinaire Cory Wong. The group’s musicianship is on full-display on one of their most popular tunes, “Dean Town”:

English singer-songwriter Mary Spender built her career on her videos. “Sleeping Tonight” is the most recent.

Her cover of Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” showcases Mary’s smokey vocals and solid guitar playing:

In future Friday NIghts Music posts, I’ll try to highlight more emerging artists who may not be on the pop music charts.

One other advantage I believe YouTube has over streaming services like Spotify and Pandora, and even video sites like TikTok or Instagram: Videos are not consigned to a particular shelf life; once posted, they are online forever. This allows users to find music from decades ago.

Sometimes these are videos made from original film versions, and others are audio-only versions. When my bass instructor asked me to listen to Bunny Berigan’s 1937 recording of “I Can’t Get Started With You”, of course I found it on YouTube. If you are fascinated by the early forms of the blues, recordings like Ma Rainey’s “Jealous Hearted Blues” (1924) are available. Maybe you have a taste for ‘gypsy jazz’; you’s be able to find great examples like this rendition of “Honeysuckle Rose” by the Quintette of the Hot Club of France featuring Django Reinhardt (guitar) and Stéphane Grappelli (violin).

From its founding in 2005, YouTube was primarily based on the relative ease individuals could create content with inexpensive hardware and software. It soon became apparent that film can be converted to a conforming video format and posted. It allows user to think of the platform as a library as well as an entertainment service. And that has given rise to some creative uses of old and new. Enjoy this mashup, “Old Movie Stars Dance to Uptown Funk”:

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