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I have John of wow-factor.com to thank for turning me on to an amazing mashup of music by an Israeli named "Kutiman". Kutiman has mixed a variety of disparate YouTube videos, creating amazing new music. Rarely does something cross my desk that astounds me. This did.

Israeli Musician "Kutiman" Mixes YouTube Videos to Make a New Vibe

Kutiman: Israeli Ophir Kutiel (AKA Kutiman) has created a mash-up of YouTube videos, into new music videos. His labor of musical love is challenging copyright laws and is simply amazing. Give it a listen.

Every once in a while, you run across something on the Internet that blows your socks off and redefines your very understanding of the world. So it was for me, when my Australian mate turned me onto Thru-You, an online album of recycled YouTube music.

"Wow," Scott said, replaying the music again and again, in an effort to digest and fully comprehend the creative genius at work.

"The vision, patience, technical and musical knowledge that's required [to pull together unrelated YouTube videos and mix them into a completely new sound] is just astounding," Scott claimed, upon watching (and hearing) "The Mother of All Funk Chords", which is the first of seven songs contained in this online album.

See if you agree. Watch Kutiman's YouTube mix and learn more about the controversy that it created!

You-Tube, i-Tube, We-All-Tube for You-Tube!

The premise is simple: Pull together various YouTube videos and extract bits and pieces and cobble them together (repeating portions ad-nauseously, if necessary) to make something that is both compelling and completely new. The artistry, of course, is in the doing of it. Which is why, until now, we've not seen such a construction. It was bound to happen, of course, and it was finally perpetrated by an Israeli by the name of Ophir Kutiel (AKA Kutiman).

I think part of Kutiman's success is that he utilized many YouTube "music lesson" videos, which contain pure music, emanating from a single instrument and which are uncluttered by other musicians and noise. Regardless, the result is astounding and even if you don't like funk, you can appreciate what Kutiman has wrought!

It's a true Tower of Power! Here you go ... presenting the first track off of Kutiman's YouTube album "ThruYou" is "The Mother of All Funk Chords!"

Creative Genius or Stolen Loot?

Sarah Amstutz sings acappella in her living room with a baby sitting in her lap. She sings an original song and decides to post her video on YouTube. It gathers some 9,000 views in about a year.

Then along comes Kutiman. He uses Sarah's video (along with a number of others) to create a completely new tune called "Someday".

This song, as with the others by Kutiman are impressive! We're not talking about straight editing here. Kutiman put in oodles of time, effort and creative energy into synthesizing, amalgamating and processing all these disparate musical (and visual) bits. In the case of "Someday", Sarah's acapella is accompanied by a wide variety of eclectic musical instruments: farfisa mini organ, conga, vibraphone, recorder, roland synthesizer, a Tibetan bowl and a Jews harp, just to name a few.

With the amazed mass, come the sniveling lawyers, each claiming, "Copyright infringement." Kutiman's new album of mashed-up YouTube videos has garnered a number of comments over at Techdirt. How long will it be before a certain Mr. Ophir Kutiel finds himself holding a registered letter from a multi-named legal firm, requesting his presence in some over-wooded room full of legal albatrosses?

Personally, I hope "never". In this case at least, the total is far greater than the sum of its parts.

Credit Where Credit is Due

• BB-King-looking Drummer
• Biker-looking guitar dude
• Hip-hop base player
• Bongo Drummer ... not included in Kutiman's Credits (?)
• Sax player
• 1st Trombone
• the trumpet kid
• Flugle horn looking thing
• Cool guitar player w/baseball shirt on
• Living room harmonica player/singer
• Orange baseball shirt guy w/a beard on an organ
• Piano dude w/a beard
• Showoff electric guitar
• Blurry Sax Player
• Redneck w/Antenna
• Fitness Room-Looking Guy
• Finger-riffs on guitar
• Bass Player
• Guitar Riff
• Contrabass Trombone
• Orange pom-pom kids

Kutiman: With several albums to his own name, including many original tunes, this musician has set the recording industry on its ear, with his latest YouTube mash-up. I can barely "play" my CD-player and this guy is weaving magic in ways no-one has done before!

One factor to consider is the fact that Kutiman didn't just yard over video from YouTube, incorporate it into a new work and then moved on - he credits everyone's video that was used in his creation and even gives them "thanks" on his website.

To follow through, let's look at each of the "players" in his first song "The Mother of All Funk Chords" - roughly in order of appearance:

Digging Deeper

• Kutiman's Website (music, pictures ... more)