Other artists music question

My wife asked me this the other day and I wasn’t sure.  Do you have to get any special permission from the copyright holder of other artists’s songs you record and place on a CD or on YouTube?  I follow the German drummer Sina and she puts a lot of covers on her YouTube channel using drumless tracks of other artists songs then adds her own drumming. She said she doesn’t make any money off of them because that goes to the copyright holder.  But in your case you’re playing the songs yourself so we were wondering how that works.  Thank you.