to use a Youtube channel as DS's music teacher

[KingscoteStaff]

DS 12 plays the cello but would like to have a go at the bass guitar over the holidays - I think there is a plan to form a band with guitar playing friend and drummer friend.

I have hired him a bass and an amp (and some headphones), but am I being U to expect him to pick up bass playing from a screen tutor? Do these things even exist?

I'm hoping some of his cello skills will be transferable - perhaps not...

There are plenty of shit hot guitarists who taught themselves to play long before they dreamed up youtube.

There must be loads of stuff on there to learn how, I had a go at the bass and it bloody hurts your fingers! But they harden up given time.

How much does he want it do you reckon?

If it's a lot he'll learn whatever obstacles he comes up against.

He has a background in strings and the desire to learn, he'll have enough for a garage band in a fortnight!

Ok, am off to google Really Good Bass Tutor Videos....

A cheap second-hand bass-guitar book off e-bay will have tuning/fingering/tab notes, and if he can already play an instrument - with that and youtube he'll be well away.

(My DH teaches guitar and he says he wishes he could persuade more of his pupils to get together and just play - much more fun, and they learn loads).

Oh, just remembered - order yourself some ear-plugs too!

My ds has taught himself the guitar by you tube videos. He is a really good player now and does open mic nights across the City. (he sings as well)
Your ds will probably pick it up really easily if he plays cello already

I learned ukulele from YouTube and a lot of guitar too :)

As a cello teacher, if he's reading bass guitar music as opposed to tab, the stuff he'll have learnt note-reading-wise and rhythm-wise will have helped. However, the strings on a bass guitar are completely different to a cello (they're the same as a double bass) so that might confuse him a bit at the start. However, please don't let him give up the cello EVER in favour of the guitar, he'll thank me for it when he's older and all the girls are after him. Trust me, there's nothing sexier than a really hot male cellist :) I'm married to one!

OK, I've looked - there are THOUSANDS!

Has anyone used one? Do we have a Mumsnet-approved bass Youtube tutor?

For some reason the guitar always felt to me like it was an instrument that it was more acceptable to learn without a teacher than any other. Maybe because guitar tab is so intuitive?

Anyway, I'm (slowly) learning the guitar from various books etc, and finding it fairly successful, so I'm sure that youtube tutorials and some good books with chord diagrams would get him started just fine. And there's a real pleasure to just fiddling around with an instrument from scratch on your own.

Tell him to pik a song he really likes and work out the bassline for himself - it's one of the exercises that my husband gives his students and it is a really good way to learn how the patterns repeat, how to really listen to the bass in a song and how to replicate the kinds of sounds that he likes and will therefore probably want to play. The fact that he can probably watch videos will make it a bit easier to pick up techniques, and he will learn more if he is mastering the kinds of songs he will actually want to play.