Béla Fleck

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Béla Fleck

Béla Fleck performing on February 9, 2007.
Background information
Birth name Béla Anton Leoš Fleck
Born July 10, 1958 (1958-07-10) (age 51)
New York City, New York, U.S.
Origin Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Genre(s) Bluegrass, jazz, jazz fusion, folk, classical
Occupation(s) Musician, songwriter, composer,
Instrument(s) Banjo, guitar
Years active 1978–present
Associated acts Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, Trio!, Strength in Numbers, New Grass Revival, Sparrow Quartet
Website www.BelaFleck.com
Notable instrument(s)
Deering Crossfire electric banjo with custom pickups and synthesizer pickup

Béla Fleck (born July 10, 1958 in New York City, New York) is an American banjo player. He is best known for his work with the band Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, with bassist Victor Wooten, saxophonist Jeff Coffin and percussionist Future Man.

Contents

[edit] Life and early career

Béla Anton Leoš Fleck, who is named after famous Hungarian composer Béla Bartók, Bohemian composer Antonín Dvořák, and Czech composer Leoš Janáček,[1] was drawn to the banjo when he first heard Earl Scruggs play the theme song for the television show Beverly Hillbillies. He received his first banjo at age fifteen from his grandfather (1973).[2][3] He was a member of the class of 1970 at P.S. 75 (the Emily Dickinson School) in Manhattan. Later, Fleck enrolled in New York City's High School of Music and Art where he studied the French horn. He was a banjo student under Tony Trischka.

Almost immediately after high school, Fleck traveled to Boston to play with Jack Tottle, Pat Enright, and Mark Schatz in Tasty Licks. During this period, Fleck released his first solo album (1979): Crossing the Tracks and made his first foray into progressive bluegrass composition.

Fleck played on the streets of Boston with bassist Mark Schatz; and the two, along with guitarist/vocalist Glen Lawson and mandolin great Jimmy Gaudreau, formed Spectrum: the Band in 1981. Fleck toured with Spectrum during 1981. That same year, Sam Bush asked Fleck to join New Grass Revival. Fleck performed with New Grass Revival for nine years. During this time, Fleck recorded another solo album, Drive. It was nominated for a Grammy Award in the then first-time category of "Best Bluegrass Album" (1988).

During the 1980s Fleck and Bush also performed live occasionally with Doc Watson and Merle Watson in various bluegrass festivals, most notably the annual Telluride Bluegrass Festival.

[edit] Béla Fleck and the Flecktones

Fleck (right) with Victor Wooten.

Béla Fleck and Victor Wooten formed Béla Fleck and the Flecktones in 1988, along with keyboardist and harmonica player Howard Levy and Wooten's percussionist brother Roy "Future Man" Wooten, who played synthesizer-based percussion. Levy left the group in 1992, making the band a trio until Saxophonist Jeff Coffin joined the group onstage part-time in 1997, eventually becoming a permanent member. His first studio recording with the band was their 1998 album Left of Cool. In 1996, he appeared on the tribute album to Hank Marvin, one of his influences, and The Shadows "Twang" playing a Shadows UK hit from the 1960s, "The Stranger".

With the Flecktones, Fleck has been nominated for and won several Grammy awards. (Cf. Grammy sections below.)

[edit] Other music and recordings

Fleck has shared Grammy wins with Asleep at the Wheel, Alison Brown, and Edgar Meyer. He has been nominated in more categories than any other musician,[1] namely country, pop, jazz, bluegrass, classical, folk, spoken word, composition, and arranging.

Béla Fleck at Massey Hall, Toronto, ON

In 2001, Fleck collaborated with long-time friend and playing-partner Edgar Meyer to record Perpetual Motion, an album of classical material played on the banjo along with an assortment of accompanists, including John Williams, Evelyn Glennie, Joshua Bell and Gary Hoffman. The album includes selections such as Chopin's Etude Op. 10 No. 4 in C# minor, Debussy's Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum, and Paganini's Moto Perpetuo (from which is derived the name), as well as more lyrical pieces such as the first movement of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, two of Chopin's mazurkas, and two Scarlatti keyboard sonatas. Perpetual Motion won two Grammys at the Grammy Awards of 2002 for Best Classical Crossover Album and Best Arrangement for Fleck and Meyer's arrangement of Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum. Fleck and Meyer have also composed a double concerto for banjo and bass, and performed its debut with the Nashville Symphony Orchestra.[1]

Fleck names Chick Corea, Charlie Parker, and the aforementioned Earl Scruggs as influences. [4] He regards Scruggs as "certainly the best" banjo player of the three-finger style.[2]

Solo and with the Flecktones, Fleck has appeared at Telluride Bluegrass Festival, Merlefest, Montreal International Jazz Festival, Toronto Jazz Festival, Newport Folk Festival, Austin City Limits Music Festival, Bonnaroo, and Jazzfest, among others.

He has also appeared as a sideman with artists ranging from Tony Rice to Dave Matthews Band to Ginger Baker and Phish. One notable appearance with the Dave Matthews Band, along with the rest of the Flecktones, resulted in the longest singular live song in DMB history, #41, at 32:03 in length.

In 2005, while the Flecktones were on hiatus, Fleck undertook several new projects: recording with African traditional musicians; cowriting a documentary film called Bring it Home about the Flecktones' first year off in 17 years and their reunion after that time; coproducing Song of the Traveling Daughter, the debut album by Abigail Washburn (a young banjo player who mixes bluegrass and Chinese music); forming the acoustic fusion supergroup Trio! with fellows Jean-Luc Ponty and Stanley Clarke, and recording an album as a member of the Sparrow Quartet (along with Abigail Washburn, Ben Sollee, and Casey Driessen).

Fleck performs with Chick Corea, March 1, 2008

In late 2006, Fleck teamed up with Chick Corea to record an album, The Enchantment, released in May 2007 [5]. Fleck and Corea toured together throughout 2007.

In July 2007 at the Winnipeg Folk Festival, he appeared and jammed with Toumani Diabaté, a kora player from Mali. He is also scheduled to play the 2009 Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival with Toumani Diabaté.

Fleck has also played with Malian ngoni(ancestor of the banjo) player Cheick Hamala Diabate.

In December 2007, he performed charity concerts in Germany to help promote AIDS awareness. His largest concert was held in Grosse Halle Bern on December 1, 2007.

On June 13, 2008, he performed as part of The Bluegrass Allstars, composed of bluegrass heavyweights Sam Bush, Luke Bulla, Edgar Meyer, Bryan Sutton, and Jerry Douglas at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Tennessee.

The next day Fleck performed with Abigail Washburn and the Sparrow Quartet also at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival.

[edit] Banjos played

[citation needed]

[edit] Discography

[edit] Solo/with multiple other musicians

[edit] As part of a musical group

Tasty Licks

  • Tasty Licks (Rounder Records, 1978)
  • Anchored to the Shore (Rounder Records, 1979)

Spectrum

  • Opening Roll (Rounder Records, 1981)
  • Too Hot For Words (Rounder Records, 1982)
  • Live in Japan (Rounder Records, 1983)

The New Grass Revival

Béla Fleck and the Flecktones

The Sparrow Quartet with Abigail Washburn, Casey Driessen, and Ben Sollee

[edit] One-off collaborations

[edit] As a guest musician

[edit] Grammy awards

[6]

[edit] Grammy nominations

Béla Fleck has been nominated in more categories than any other musician in Grammy history.[7][8]

  • 2008
    • Pop Instrumental Album Jingle All The Way
    • Country Instrumental Performance Sleigh Ride (from Jingle All The Way)
  • 2006
  • 2005
    • Country Instrumental Who's Your Uncle (from Best Kept Secret by Jerry Douglas)
    • Contemporary Jazz Album Soulgrass by Bill Evans
  • 2002
    • Country Instrumental Performance Bear Mountain Hop (from The Country Bears Soundtrack)
  • 2000
    • Pop Instrumental Zona Mona (from Outbound)
  • 1999
    • Bluegrass Bluegrass Sessions
  • 1998
    • Pop Instrumental Big Country (from Left Of Cool)
    • Country Instrumental The Ride (from Restless On the Farm by Jerry Douglas)
  • 1996
    • World Music Tabula Rasa
  • 1995
  • 1994
    • Spoken Word For Children The Creation by Amy Grant
  • 1992
    • Jazz Instrumental Magic Fingers (from UFO Tofu)
  • 1991
  • 1990
    • Jazz Album Bela Fleck & The Flecktones
    • Jazz Instrumental
  • 1989
  • 1988
    • Bluegrass album Drive
  • 1987
  • 1986

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b c Béla Fleck, Official Biography
  2. ^ a b PBS Interview with Béla Fleck
  3. ^ Interview with Béla, 21 April 1996
  4. ^ Interview on Béla Fleck & the Flecktones 2000 DVD, “Live at the Quick”
  5. ^ Levine, Doug (24 April 2007). "Chick Corea, Bela Fleck Collaborate On New CD". VOA News (Voice of America). http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2007-04/2007-04-24-voa68.cfm. Retrieved on 1 January 2009. 
  6. ^ http://www.grammy.com/GRAMMY_Awards/Winners/Results.aspx?title=&winner=Bela+Fleck&year=0&genreID=0&hp=1 Grammy Award Winners Béla Fleck
  7. ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Award_records#Nominations
  8. ^ The Flecktone Zoo: by Wendell Norman

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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v • d • e
Béla Fleck and the Flecktones
Jeff Coffin · Béla Fleck · Future Man · Victor Wooten
Howard Levy
Studio albums
Live albums
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