WebProNews

Music tutorials for popular songs with a British bent have become available at Now Play It, a site featuring guitar, bass, and drum lessons for a fee.

The persistent efforts by music publishers that has pushed a lot of tab notation off the Internet may be responsible for the new model in music instruction arriving on the Web.

Called Now Play It, the site features about 300 tutorials for individual songs. Big name artists like David Bowie, Radiohead, and KT Tunstall have tracks present on the service.

Visitors pay a small fee for tutorials, which may be in either Full or Lite format depending on the length of the lesson. The order is fulfilled online and delivered in Windows Media Format.

Previews of lessons may be viewed before buying. Guitar and bass lessons show an inset image of the chords being played. The real appeal comes from who is teaching the lessons, as many of the tutorials feature the original artist doing the teaching:

The Lesson is an exclusively filmed direct 1 to 1 tutorial with an artist. Each one is shot in a unique location, be it at the artists house, studio or backstage on tour. Lessons last an average of 15 - 25mins and take the user through how to play every aspect of the song, from chords, techniques and/or equipment used.

Not all lessons will have this feature. Lite and In House tutorials demonstrate the techniques needed to play a particular section of a song, minus the celebrity musician's participation.

A number of guitar lessons by individuals have appeared on video sharing sites like YouTube. Some of those people have run afoul of music copyright holders who have demanded such unauthorized works be taken down from the Internet.

We asked Now Play It for details on how they are compensating music rightsholders, who certainly will demand payment for usage of songs and artists in training videos. A company representative said Now Play It has partnerships with the labels behind the artists.