Béla Fleck and the Flecktones
Béla Fleck and the Flecktones is an American band that combines jazz and bluegrass music.
Béla Fleck and the Flecktones
Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.
1988–2012, 2016–present
The Flecktones formed in 1988 when Béla Fleck was invited to perform on the PBS TV series The Lonesome Pine Specials. The original members were Fleck on banjo, Victor Wooten on bass guitar, his brother Roy Wooten on Drumitar, and Howard Levy on harmonica and keyboards. After Levy's departure in 1992 the group continued as a trio for several years until recruiting Jeff Coffin in 1997 on saxophones. Coffin quit the group in 2010, and Levy rejoined in 2011.
History[edit]
Formation[edit]
Near the end of his time with the New Grass Revival band, Fleck was invited to play for the Lonesome Pine Special on PBS in 1988,[1] and he gathered a group of musicians to assist him. He had met Howard Levy the year before at the Winnipeg Folk Festival. Victor Wooten auditioned over the phone and volunteered his brother Roy as a potential member.[2]
After the PBS performance, Fleck decided to keep the group together, calling it Bela Fleck and the Flecktones. His compositions became more complex. The Flecktones merged bluegrass with jazz, presenting record store owners with the problem of selecting a genre under which to stock their whimsically titled albums, whose covers bore cartoons. The leader played electric banjo and was influenced by the Kentucky bluegrass of Earl Scruggs and "The Ballad of Jed Clampett". Victor Wooten broke into jazz bass solos. Roy Wooten called himself "Future Man" and played drumitar, an instrument of his own creation. Melodies were usually taken by Howard Levy. Their first video, "Sinister Minister", was in rotation at the networks VH-1, which played pop and adult contemporary music; BET, the Black Entertainment channel; and Country Music Television. They performed at jazz festivals with soul singer Stevie Wonder, blues guitarist Bonnie Raitt, and the Christian a cappella group Take 6. Followers of the Grateful Dead took note.[1]
Recording[edit]
Their debut album, Béla Fleck and the Flecktones (Warner Bros, 1989), received a Grammy nomination for Best Contemporary Jazz Album, as did their second album, Flight of the Cosmic Hippo (Warner Bros., 1991), which also received a nomination for Best Instrumental Composition for the song "Blu-Bop". Their second album contained the Flecktones's version of "The Star-Spangled Banner". Their next album had another cartoon cover and the palindromic title UFO TOFU (Warner Bros., 1992). The song "Bonnie & Slyde" had Fleck playing banjo atypically with a slide, an idea suggested to him by slide guitarist Bonnie Raitt.[1]
UFO Tofu would be the last album the Flecktones recorded with their original lineup until Rocket Science in 2011. Howard Levy left the band in December 1992. While the departure of Levy was tough for the band, it was not unexpected. During their 1992 tour it became evident to the band that Levy was not happy with the rigors of touring and wanted to spend more time with his wife and children.[3]
The remaining trio, consisting of Fleck and the Wooten brothers, recorded their fourth album, Three Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. "'Once we started rehearsing, everything was fine,' said Fleck. 'We started finding ways to sound good, and it was real exciting.'" Without Levy, the Flecktones as usual spent most of 1993 on the road and released Three Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest in September of that year.[3]
Critical reception[edit]
Thom Jurek of AllMusic.com called the Flecktones's music an "unclassifiable meld of jazz, progressive bluegrass, rock, classical, funk, and world music traditions," a style sometimes dubbed "blu-bop".[14]
Of the album Béla Fleck and the Flecktones critic Geoffrey Himes wrote, "Fleck's banjo-playing takes the quartet on wide tangents through the outer space of jazz improvisation and minimalist composition, but he always brings them back to the traditions of rural America."[15]
The quartet received attention for their musical innovations and invention, including praise from music critic Bill Kolhaase. However, he was critical of the band's lack of a drum kit, claiming that Wooten's "electronic beat seemed a bit muddy compared to the real thing".[16]
Cosmic Hippo was received favorably. Himes applauded their prodigious improvisatory ability.[17] John Griffin of The Gazette also praised the group's ability to create such an individual style that "the whole of idea of style disappears."[18] Mike Joyce, of The Washington Post was impressed by the Flecktones' ability to maintain a distinct voice. Joyce called a Flecktones show a "musical free-for-all, embracing the band's recorded material and venturing off into the great unknown."[19] Jim Santella of The Buffalo News praised the band's mastery of styles and their ability to weave together complicated pieces. Santella even compared Fleck's playing to a "miniature Bach canon."[20]
Geoffrey Himes remarked that Left of Cool sounded too ordinary. In his negative review he wrote, "Unfortunately the Flecktones' first studio album in five years reveals that they've become a very ordinary band."[21] Himes adds, "The four Flecktones are all marvelous musicians, and they come up with imaginative parts for the new album's 15 cuts. The overall concept, however has diminished into easy-to-digest pop-jazz, for which there is too much already."[21]
Hidden Land received mixed reviews. Critic Michael Endelman of Entertainment Weekly, wrote that the Flecktones sound "hasn't aged well."[22] Dan Ouelette of Billboard found Hidden Land to be "by far their best album." Ouelette was particularly impressed by the quartet's range of repertoire in this album.[23]
Jingle All the Way was well received. Geoffrey Himes praised the band for being able to package the Flecktones' complex sound into an easily digestible holiday album without having to compromise.[24]
Jeff Kelman of Jazz Times writes favorably about Rocket Science and Levy's reunion with the Flecktones, "Rocket Science recaptures everything that made the Flecktones so fresh, so innovative, so important during its first five years."[25] Kelman particularly praised the album's writing and the interactions between Levy and Fleck. AllMusic critic Thom Jurek also gave Rocket Science a rave review, "Rocket Science fires on all cylinders and comes off as a fresh and exciting reintroduction to a newly energized Flecktones."[14]