What is YouTube? And Why It Matters for Folk Music

After yesterday's post about finding The Rattlin' Bog on YouTube, I got several emails from people asking "What is YouTube?" Which is fair enough — it's fairly new and not everyone has heard of it. So today I'm going to explain what it is, how it works, and why I think it could be absolutely massive for folk music.

What is YouTube?

YouTube is a website — youtube.com — where people can upload videos and anyone can watch them. For free. On your computer. I know that sounds mental, but it's real. I've been using it for two days and it's real.

Think of it like this: you know the way you can put pictures on a website? YouTube is like that, but with VIDEO. Moving pictures. With sound. You press play and it just... plays. On your screen. Like a tiny telly inside your computer.

How Does It Work?

You go to youtube.com. You type what you're looking for in the search box. It shows you videos. You click one. It plays. That's it.

Now, I should warn you: you need broadband. If you're on dial-up like me, it's rough. The video loads very slowly. It stops and starts. Sometimes it takes ten minutes to buffer a three-minute video. I've been watching The Rattlin' Bog video in bursts — thirty seconds of watching, two minutes of waiting, thirty more seconds of watching. It's worth it, but it's not ideal.

If your school or workplace has broadband, you might want to watch it there. Just make sure your boss isn't looking. Or invite your boss to watch. Everyone should watch.

Why Should You Care?

Here's where I get excited. And I mean MORE excited than I was yesterday, which I didn't think was possible.

YouTube could change EVERYTHING for folk music. Here's why:

Preservation

Folk songs live in people's mouths. They exist because people sing them, and they die when people stop. We've lost songs over the centuries — melodies forgotten, verses lost, whole traditions that nobody wrote down disappearing when the last person who knew them passed on.

But what if you could RECORD them? Not just audio — video. A full performance, with the singing and the clapping and the joy on people's faces. And then put it on the internet where ANYONE could find it. Forever.

My nan knew every verse of The Rattlin' Bog. She's gone now, and her voice went with her. If YouTube had existed when she was alive, I could have recorded her singing in the kitchen in Kilrush and uploaded it. And her voice would be there forever. Anyone could hear it. Her great-grandchildren could hear it.

Think about that. It makes me emotional just typing it.

Access

Not everyone can get to a trad session. Not everyone lives near a pub that has one. Not everyone lives in Ireland. But if someone in a session records a performance and puts it on YouTube, suddenly a person in Tokyo or Cape Town or Buenos Aires can experience a trad session. Not the same as being there, obviously — you can't smell the Guinness through a computer screen — but it's something. It's a window into a world they might never otherwise see.

Learning

If you want to learn The Rattlin' Bog, you can read the lyrics on this website. That helps. But watching someone SING it? Seeing how they pace it, how they build the speed, how they handle the flea verse? That's a thousand times more useful. You can learn songs from YouTube the way people used to learn from each other — by watching and listening and copying.

Sharing

I've been trying to explain the magic of The Rattlin' Bog on this website for six months. Words are good. Words are what I've got. But a video is worth a thousand blog posts. When someone asks me "what's the big deal about this song?" I can now say "watch this" and send them a link. The song speaks for itself.

The Possibilities

I'm letting my imagination run here, but think about what could happen:

• Every trad session in Ireland could be recorded and uploaded
• Regional variations could be documented with actual video evidence
• Old recordings of singers could be digitised and preserved
• People could learn tunes and songs from the best musicians in the country
• A kid in Australia whose grandparents came from Cork could hear the songs they grew up with

The folk tradition has always been about passing things from person to person. YouTube is just... a really big room. Where everyone can hear everyone else.

My Prediction

I'm going to make a prediction, and you can hold me to it: YouTube is going to be one of the most important things that's ever happened to folk music. Maybe not tomorrow. Maybe not this year. But give it time. Give people time to discover it, to start uploading, to start sharing.

In ten years, there will be thousands of Irish folk performances on YouTube. Mark my words.

In the Meantime

Go watch The Rattlin' Bog on YouTube. Tell everyone you know. Upgrade to broadband if you can afford it. And if you have a camera — even one of those small digital cameras — record a session. Record your nan singing. Record your nephew singing on his chair. And when you figure out how to upload it, put it on YouTube.

The future is here, lads. And it's full of bogs.

BogLord2002

P.S. — I have now watched The Rattlin' Bog video twenty-three times. Rattlin' the cat has given up trying to understand and is sleeping on the modem.