YouTube instructional videos

[Mike Baker]

I thought I would start a thread for the best of banjo instructional videos on YouTube. There are hundreds of videos out there and it can be overwhelming for beginners, but maybe the collective editorial wisdom of this site can make this thread a better first stop than a random selection of YouTube results.

I'll start with this fine series of videos by Danny Barnes.

[Mike Baker]

Here are the final two videos in the series:

[johnl]

Thanks, Mike! I was just about to make an 'I have a banjo; now what?' post.

[MarkHawkins]

Okay so Danny Barnes, now I gotta go out & buy a couple new albums. Thanks a heap Mike! (Seriously, great videos) First thing I wonder is, "Apparently I don't really need picks?"

[Mike Baker]

First thing I wonder is, "Apparently I don't really need picks?"

Here is another great video for beginners that addresses this question:

[MarkHawkins]

Dang, just when it gets to him talking about finger picks.... (I guess I'm just gonna have to break down & subscribe!) I did learn that I've been wearing my thumb pick wrong so thanks again Mike. I really like my Golden Gate L, looking like I'm going to need an XL though. I'll try boiling the L first but if you keep this up Mike I might need a loan!

[Tobin]

For the clawhammer players out there, these are the ones that got me going. This is Josh Turknett who runs clawhammerbanjo.net and the "Brainjo" series. Aside from being a flat-out nice guy, he's an amazing resource for all things clawhammer. He releases a weekly tune of the week with video and tab, and has recently added a song of the week as well. He also recently released an album of old-time banjo & fiddle playing, including a banjo player's edition with tab and fiddle tracks so you can play banjo along with the fiddle (at full speed or a slower speed). He's always coming up with new and interesting ways to teach and make it easy to learn.

This is an 8-part series called "How to Learn to Play Clawhammer Banjo in 8 Essential Steps". I'm having to split this up into 3 posts, but I figured it was worth putting them all here.

[Tobin]

[Tobin]

[Patrick Costello]

My father and I have been teaching on YouTube since '06. With 4,393,134 views we must be doing something right. https://www.youtube.com/user/Dobro33H

There are almost 700 videos on my channel. In addition to videos, I also have written several books. You can learn more at http://frailingbanjo.com

I am not quite gauche enough to post every video. I'll just post a few:

[Patrick Costello]

Hmmm . . . I used the YouTube tag, but the videos never went up. I'll just post some URL's.

-Patrick

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCGbZDgZwJa3ZZUQO06JlcMnBKkUu8wYp

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...H4WC2AaeekCDT1

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...OoQt3oaXfqCFwP

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...im361_RXF8QUUK

[Banjo Cafe]

Patrick, bear with us a minute and we'll correct those them follow-up with some assistance on how to insert those.

[Banjo Cafe]

Two ways to post:

1) If you use the YouTube icon, only insert the part of the address after the v= part. So for v=qo0cy0REMY8, you'd insert just qo0cy0REMY8

2) Or just take the entire YouTube web URL and post it into the general video tool that is to the right on the toolbar above and looks like a piece of film (that stuff no one uses these days).

Using the YouTube insert button the videos are a little smaller but for the long haul they're probably more reliable. We won't go into that discussion!

[Banjo Cafe]

The Banjo Cafe presents, through the unabashed theft of source code from, ahem, some mandolin web site, the following instructions:

Two ways to post videos:

Step 1 - Go to Advanced Posting mode. At the bottom of each thread or if you click the + Reply to Thread button (top left of each thread) you are placed in Quick Reply mode (not what you want). Click Go Advanced (lower right). Your posting area should now look like this below, only we've highlighted the YouTube and Vimeo buttons you're going to use to embed your video.

This is what an Advanced posting window looks like:


Step 2 - Embedding YouTube and Vimeo is essentially identical but we'll show that below. To embed a YouTube video, you first need to acquire the YouTube video ID. Here's what you're going to see in your browser when you're at a YouTube page. Every web browser has an address or URL field. We've highlighted the video ID for you underlined in red:



Step 3 - Copy only the video ID, click the YouTube button in the Advanced window and paste the video ID into the dialogue box you received by clicking the YouTube button. Example:



Step 4 - Click OK and your video is successfully embedded and you're ready to post.

Same process as above demonstrated for Vimeo

Vimeo video ID underlined in red as shown in a browser address or URL field:



Vimeo dialogue box you received after click the Vimeo icon in Advance Posting mode:



The most important part of this tutorial:

Yes, there are other ways to get videos to work, but unless you're doing it exactly as shown here, there's no promise that video will be displayed properly in the future. Example: Vimeo recently changed the way they allow their videos to be embedded. For old videos posted correctly in the past, those will now display on phones and hand-held devices. Cool! For those old Vimeo videos that are visible in the browser but were not added correctly, sorry--they don't display at all. Boooooo.

Look, we don't care if you just want to provide a link instead of embedding, but conversations flow better when videos are embedded, and embedded correctly. If you want someone to see a video you're interested in, the first rule is don't make them click on a link unless you just have to because half (or more) won't. This is one of the oldest and wisest known usability truths on the web.

[MarkHawkins]

Patrick, I just watched the 4 videos in your basic frailing playlist & gotta say I loved 'em. I've watched a few other instructional videos on clawhammer that confused me but yours made it very clear and your positive, 'you can do this' attitude made me want to give it a shot. Thanks!

[Patrick Costello]

Okay. Let's try this again . . .



It works! Whoo!

Thanks for the how-to. It was really helpful.

-Patrick

[Jim Pankey]

Here's a lesson I did for Greg Rich...