Helen Newby

Helen Newby

From YouTube channel Helen Newby

Helen Newby is a professional musician and a music teacher. She is a founding member of the string trio Chartreuse and the Amaranth Quartet. Helen received her Bachelor’s degree in Music from the Oberlin Conservatory in 2013, and her Master’s degree in Cello Performance from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music in 2015. She has played in venues ranging “from Carnegie Hall, Disney Hall, and The Fillmore to jazz clubs, dive bars, and art galleries” in North America and Europe. See http://www.helennewby.com/.

Helen frequently uploads cello covers of popular songs on YouTube. She is relatively new to YouTube - she posted her first YouTube video in 2020 - so as of May 31, 2022, she had only 2,300 subscribers. Due to COVID, her ability to do live performances has been limited, hence she started to arrange, record, and film the multi-cello pop cover versions of popular songs (what she calls the “World’s Best Songs”) such as Toxic by Britney Spears, Peg by Steely Dan, and Welcome to the Black Parade by My Chemical Romance. By working with new video-editing software, she arranges her songs by filming herself playing each part and combining the videos together, turning herself into a one-woman orchestra. The results are beautiful:

A cover song is a new recording or performance of a song by a musician other than the original songwriter or performer of the song. Posting cover songs on YouTube has been an effective way for young musicians to gain publicity and get discovered. Famous pop musicians such as Justin Bieber and Shawn Mendes were discovered on YouTube performing cover songs.

When musicians post cover versions of songs on YouTube, they are subject to copyright restrictions. Copyright law protects creative works such as songs. When a songwriter creates music and lyrics, under copyright law the songwriter has the exclusive right to publicly perform the song and create derivative works based on it. Musicians who wish to play a cover version of the song on YouTube need to have permission to do so in the form of a license.

There are two types of music licenses that YouTubers need to post videos of them playing cover songs: mechanical and synchronization licenses. A mechanical license is a contract between a musician who wishes to record a cover song and the copyright owner of the original song that permits the musician to record his or her cover version in an audio-only format (interactive audio streams, digital downloads, CDs). A synchronization license is a contract between a musician and the copyright owner of a song that permits the musician to pair the copyrighted song with video. To get a synchronization license, musicians must contact and negotiate with the copyright holder, which is often difficult to do. As a result, YouTubers playing cover songs often rely on YouTube’s Content ID system to notify copyright holders.

In order to monetize content on YouTube, a YouTuber must have at least 1,000 subscribers, and 4,000 watch hours during 12 consecutive months. Helen currently meets only the first requirement, so her videos are not yet monetized. Through Spotify, Helen is able to make some revenue through her covers. She mentions that she has not earned much revenue through Spotify, as much as she would if she was able to monetize her content on YouTube.

Rumi Robinson

Josh Floyd