My favorite YouTube music learning resources
YouTube is a fantastic source of entertainment as well as education. Though its origins are related to home video philosophy, the quality of its content today in many cases surpasses that of a regular TV program. I’ll be writing about learning resources on the topic I’m interested in the most (music), specifically music composition, production, and virtual orchestration. You can find a ton of videos on YouTube related to these subjects, but I’ll be focusing only on those YouTube channels which had actually helped me learn and understand the skills that I could immediately put into practice. Many of these skills I’m now using daily.
This YouTube channel is run by a renowned music producer Kenny Gioia, who is also a fantastic educator. He has published a lot of music production tutorials for professional repositories such as Groove3. Mr. Gioia is perhaps the most known as the Pro Tools guru, but in this particular channel, he endorses REAPER as his working platform and shows the true possibilities and benefits of this DAW over the competition. Even if you are not a REAPER user, you can learn timeless everyday skills here. Every single video is so well-conceived that you’ll feel not only enlightened after watching but also inspired. You won't find the usual boring ramblings here, just the pure knowledge delivered humbly by a true master.
This channel is led by the well-known developer of cinematic sample libraries. A few years ago, they’ve begun releasing incredibly entertaining and educational videos in which they’re reconstructing the composition process of the short cinematic piece in various styles and moods. Here you’ll see the actual process of composition and orchestration in real-time, but also in a rather compressed manner, which will ensure your complete attention while watching. This is perhaps the best possible showcase of Project SAM libraries, but everyone watching these videos will prosper. This series offers instant inspiration and gratification. I wish there were more tutorials out there following this concept.
Evenant is the home of one of the most comprehensive online courses on the subject of composing and producing orchestral and cinematic music by using virtual instruments. Although the cost is quite high by my personal standards, you can really benefit from taking one of these, judging from the course outline. The company also maintains a YouTube channel on which you can find several useful tutorials and practical advice, however, the content is somewhat limited in quantity. At the moment, a brand new Evenant website is expecting soon. I hope this also means more new and free content on their YouTube channel.
Like Evenant, ThinkSpace Education is also a publisher of commercial courses you can enroll in and even earn a degree in composing music for media. They also have a YouTube channel where you can find a lot of free content and tutorials hosted by one of ThinkSpace educators, Guy Michelmore, a professional film composer with a lot of experience, especially in animated films for major labels such as Disney and Marvel. Mr. Michelmore presents his knowledge and experience in an easygoing and often witty manner, which often eases the understanding and adoption of the complex subjects of composition, orchestration, and virtual orchestration.
The author of this channel, media composer Ashton Gleckman, regularly reconstructs and analyzes well-known film scores from celebrated composers such as Hans Zimmer, James Horner, James Newton Howard, etc. by using his vast collection of sample libraries and virtual instruments. Although he presents these videos through commenting rather than working in real-time, you can get some useful insights on musical devices that film composers use and some practical examples on using today’s tools and resources to create cinematic music and sounds.