ArtistWorks: Teach the World
ArtistWorks is a collection of Internet-based subscription businesses developed in partnership with leading musicians and other world-renowned experts. These websites incorporate the ArtistWorks' proprietary "video exchange" platform (patent pending), allowing artist/teachers to deliver a rich, immersive, and interactive educational experience between online students and a master teacher. In the ArtistWorks approach, students submit their own videos for the artist/teacher's evaluation. Each teacher reviews the student's video and provides instruction with a Response Video that is then posted on the site alongside the student's submission in order for the entire community to learn. Breaking the barrier of one-sided learning, students receive individualized instruction from ArtistWorks' world experts, using a simple webcam, transforming online education in all visual education fields. The ArtistWorks Video Management System makes it nearly effortless for artist/teachers (even musicians "on the road") to teach and share their expertise with large numbers of appreciative students. ArtistWorks represents an elite group of exceptional master teachers and instructors, each dedicated to creating a lasting legacy as they truly "teach the world" and leave a lasting legacy by passing on their art.
The ArtistWorks Story:
The ArtistWorks platform was developed as a way to provide students all over the world access to world-class virtuoso musicians. The ArtistWorks platform allows master teachers to teach and even provide individualized feedback to large numbers of students. We have expanded to encompass online instruction sites led by six virtuoso musicians, all on the highest spectrum of their respective instruments. Utilizing the ArtistWorks platform, they easily provide one-on-one online instruction to an enthusiastic group of students throughout the globe. With the reach and efficiency of the ArtistWorks platforms, ArtistWorks instructors are destined to be among the most influential music teachers in history.
This is nothing less than a revolution in how music education takes place.
While teaching videos date from the videocassette era, and while there are other companies offering distance learning through online video libraries, Artistworks is the first to truly harness the interactive power of Internet video, as well as an addictive social media platform, to allow for two-way interactions that are recorded and can be used as almost "reference material." It’s a user experience that could only have come from someone like former AOL executive David Butler, whose development team was responsible for the original AOL 1.0 software, the catalyst that put millions online for the very first time.
The idea that became Artistworks arose organically when the recently retired Butler turned his full attention to jazz guitar, a long a smoldering passion. After attempting to learn from instructional videos, Butler sought private lessons from a well known jazz guitar teacher, sojourning to Philadelphia for study. “I got a little corporate apartment there and was just literally going to lessons every day and going home and playing until my fingers were almost bleeding,” Butler recalls.
During that extended visit, Butler learned more than just the intricacies of the fretboard, getting a peak into the hard-knock life of a professional musicians. He found that lifelong jazz musicians everywhere were facing closing clubs, thinning label rosters and CDs that rarely recouped their advances to pay a royalty stream. Many were leaving stages and studios to take non-music jobs. Butler thought that there had to be an Internet-enabled way for virtuosic artists to reach more students and thereby make a decent living.
“I came up with this idea of creating a subscriber-funded website where we’d get a bunch of guitar players to collectively employ a great teacher,” Butler recalls. “I figured if we got enough people like me who really wanted to have access to a renown teacher and a great teaching method, it wouldn’t take that much money for each of us, and the teacher would have a nice income out of it.”
So for the next year Butler and his team built a custom platform to enable musicians to provide individualized feedback to each student via video, simultaneously available to the entire community. Meanwhile, Patricia Butler, a retired financial executive (most recently with Merrill Lynch) worked to build a business model that made sense. Then the site—priced at a reasonable $60 per student for each three-month period—opened its doors and as evidenced by Patricia Butler’s early experience, quickly amassed enough students to justify its existence.
Soon the Butlers were thinking about how to extend this model to many artists, founding Artistworks to build a new generation of the online platform with built-in chat, higher resolution video and more robust social networking features. In mid-2009 Artistworks rolled out Qbert Skratch University (taught by turntablist DJ Qbert), Tony Trischka School of Banjo, Andreas Oberg Guitar Universe, Howard Levy Harmonica School and Peery Piano Online (taught by concert pianist Christine Peery-Skousen), and the Martin Taylor Guitar Academy.
The heart of each site is “video exchanges,” allowing each student to upload a video demonstrating a particular lesson, with the instructor creating a Response Video, offering feedback on the student’s technique and musicianship. Each exchange then is available to the entire community as a Video Exchange. Crucially, most videos are bite-sized, focusing on one specific aspect of musicianship, rather than the overwhelming barrage of information that’s inevitable when spending an hour with a virtuoso musician.
Ultimately, rather than serving as the “next best thing” to private lessons, for many the model has proven itself to be a better way to learn. “One of the early surprises was that people were reporting to us that they were learning and progressing faster using our ArtistWorks platform than before when they were taking in-person lesson,” David Butler recalls. The Butlers credit the endless re-watchability of the site’s material, the lack of intimidation that attends being in the room with a world-renowned player and the bite-sized nature of the curriculum for this surprising fact.
For great musicians like Martin Taylor and Tony Trishchka the results spoke for themselves. Today they rarely gives private lessons, referring all would-be students to their ArtistWorks instructional sites. Likewise, oft traveling Andreas Oberg is able to mentor and guide his guitar students while on the road or upon his return.
Despite little marketing to date beyond word-of-mouth, word has gotten out amongst aspiring musicians and virtuoso musicians alike. All of the online institutes now host large, enthusiastic communities of musicians, with established pros knocking on Artistworks’ doors.
“We’re to the point where we’re getting several inquiries from musicians each week,” David Butler notes. “Our biggest concern is to make sure our commitments are met with existing artists. But we’ll be adding more instructors, and we expect this to really take off.”
When it does, Butler hopes to have more time for his own musical pursuits. Despite having begun Artistworks as a result of his desire to master jazz guitar, the 60-to-70-hour workweeks associated with running a startup haven’t been kind to his preferred hobby!
About the Founders
David Butler, CEO ArtistWorks, Inc
Born in Memphis, Tennessee and possessed at an early age with an interest in music and a talent for computers, David graduated from the University of Maryland in 1980 with a degree in Computer Science. After a diverse career in computers and technology that included satellite ground tracking stations and ocean floor mapping, in 1988 David joined Quantum Computer Services, later to be known as AOL. Leading a small team of programmers, David and his team wrote the original AOL1.0 software. An eleven-year AOL career culminated in his becoming the VP of Technology and Strategy for the Technology Division. In 1999, David left AOL to pursue other interests, including philanthropy and serious jazz guitar studies. While studying jazz guitar, David wondered if there wasn't a way to offer a complete guitar instructional method to the world via the Internet. This led to the creation of the ArtistWorks teaching platform which unified David's technology and strategic ideas into an Internet-based teaching platform and online business. Infused with David's ideas and technology, ArtistWorks instructional websites are now the destination of choice for many hundreds of music students from over 50 countries. David has now standardized the online teaching platform, and created ArtistWorks, Inc. where he is CEO, to take his business concept and learning approach to multiple artists and experts around the world. Current artists include Martin Taylor (fingerstyle, solo guitar), Tony Trischka (banjo), Howard Levy (harmonica), DJ Qbert (Hip Hop Turntablist), Andreas Oberg (jazz and gypsy guitar), Christie Peery-Skousen (classical piano).
In July of 2008, David filed for a US patent for core inventions at the heart of the ArtistWorks Video Management System.
Patricia Butler, President ArtistWorks, Inc
Born and raised in DuBois, Pennsylvania, Patricia earned a Bachelor's Degree from Pennsylvania State University in 1983. Working in the investment management field while continuing her flute studies, Patricia rose to Assistant VP of Private Client Services at Merrill Lynch, a position she held until 1996. Patricia created the ArtistWorks business and financial model and is the President of the company. Patricia's achievements today also include her accomplishments in the area of wine studies and viticulture. She recently received her Diploma with Merit from the Wine & Spirits Education Trust in London and is now enrolled in the prestigious Institute of Masters of Wine. She is a grower and vintner of Cabernet Franc in Napa California.
