Rick Beato

Richard John Beato (/biˈɑːtoʊ/ bee-AH-toh; born April 24, 1962) is an American YouTube personality, multi-instrumentalist, music producer and educator. Since the early 1980s, he has worked variously as a musician, songwriter, audio engineer, and record producer, and has lectured on music at several universities. Based in Black Dog Sound Studios in Stone Mountain, a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia, he has produced for and worked with bands such as Needtobreathe, Parmalee, and Shinedown. He is now known for his YouTube channel, Everything Music, on which he covers different aspects of rock, jazz, and popular music, and he interviews well-known musicians and producers.

Beato was born into a large family in Fairport, New York, a suburb 9 miles (14 km) east of Rochester.He was the sixth of seven children, with two sisters and four brothers.His family life was highly musical; at an early age he was introduced to the rock music of the 1960s by his older sisters.His mother's siblings and father were musicians and music teachers, and there was always music of many different eras and genres playing in the house.He started playing cello at the age of seven, at thirteen he transitioned to the double bass and at thirteen he started playing guitar.He initially learned to play guitar by ear and trained himself, after several years he began his formal training in the instrument from a neighbor who owned a local music store.

After graduating from Fairport High School in 1980, he studied at Ithaca College, obtaining a Bachelor of Arts degree in classical bass. He earned a master's degree in jazz guitar studies from the New England Conservatory of Music in 1987.

Beato has been a session musician, university lecturer, songwriter, studio engineer, mixer, and record producer. He has lectured at several universities, including the University of Alabama and Berklee College of Music.

Rick was a member of a band named Billionaire formed in 1997 with Marc Tompkins, Walter Busbee and Darren Dodd. Upon issuing their self-produced debut LP The Goodnight Sky on the local Radio Telescope label in the spring of 1998, Billionaire signed to Republic to issue the follow-up, Ascension, in mid-2000.

Studio

Beato owns Black Dog Sound Studios in Stone Mountain, Georgia, and he began recording bands there in 1995. He ran the record label 10 Star Records with business partner Johnny Diamond.

Writing credit

"Carolina", which he co-wrote with Parmalee in 2007, reached number one on Billboard's Country Airplay chart on December 20, 2013, and has sold a million copies.

Signature guitar

In 2021, Gibson previewed a Rick Beato signature Gibson Les Paul Special Double Cut. The guitar is offered in a special TV Blue Mist finish with P-90 pickups and Beato's signature on the truss rod cover. This model is one of Gibson's few signature guitar models not associated with an artist or associated with a particular act.

Other contributions

• Welcoming Home the Astronauts (2001 Sony/Epic) by Flickerstick, was produced in part by Beato- including the songs "Smile", "Got a Feeling", and "Beautiful".
• Broken People by Muddy Magnolias, was produced in part by Beato.
• Herbie Fully Loaded (2005), producer: "More Than a Feeling"
• Raising Helen (2004), writer: "Never Be the Same"

A YouTube video of his eldest child, Dylan, who has perfect pitch and is able to identify individual notes within complex chords after just one hearing, received three million views, causing Beato to decide to parlay this social-media fame into a full-fledged YouTube channel. As of May 2023, the YouTube channel has 3.4 million subscribers.

Beato's channel is under his own name, although he introduces every video with the title "Everything Music". One series in the channel is called What Makes This Song Great?, in which Beato deconstructs and discusses the elements of popular songs. The videos in the series regularly get over one million views.He posts videos on music theory and production techniques, song lists (like "Top 20 Acoustic Guitar Intros"), and interviews with artists, producers, and other music industry professionals.

Several of Beato's YouTube videos, including those about Radiohead and Fleetwood Mac, were issued take-down notices because of copyright claims. In July 2020, Beato testified about his experiences on YouTube before a United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary reviewing the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and considering limitations and exceptions such as fair use.

In February 2023, Beato released on his YouTube channel an extensive interview video with Keith Jarrett, made at Jarrett's home and home studio after Jarrett suffered two strokes; it received nearly half a million views in its first few days of publication and was praised by journalist and radio veteran Bill King.

• The Beato Book – A Creative Approach to Improvisation for Guitar and Other Instruments.