Bela on the cover of DOWNBEAT Magazine (sans Flecktones)

by session on May 28th, 2009

Alright, so we have made a major stink about Bela Fleck’s most recent project, Throw Down Your Heart. As such, we are going to keep the shameless promotion train running by dropping a bit of recent news on you. Sorry for the overkill, but we post about what we love and we truly love this album. By the by, go out and grab the DVD documentary about the project, it ought to be insightful and full of kick ass picking.

So Bela’s project has reached the folks at Downbeat Magazine (finally) and they gave him the cover and a brief article about the project in the June 2009 issue. There may be more in the (analog) magazine, but here is what I could dig up direct from Downbeat:

Bela Fleck
Thrown Into Deep Water
By Geoffrey Himes

Backstage at the Birchmere nightclub in Alexandria, Va., Béla Fleck was exhausted. The banjo virtuoso, wearing an unbuttoned red shirt over a black T-shirt, had just finished two long sets with the Flecktones. He seemed drained, but a question about the show coaxed a smile.

This was last December. The quartet was touring behind its first-ever Christmas album, Jingle All The Way (Rounder), and those tunes had dominated the show. The restrained lyricism of the solos by Fleck and bassist Victor Wooten on “Silent Night” had segued into a fast, fusion rampage through “Sleigh Ride.” A medley of familiar carols had become a freewheeling jam until Fleck was playing one song while saxophonist Jeff Coffin played another—and making the two fit nicely.

The highlight had been a version of “The Twelve Days Of Christmas” that sequentially tackled each of the song’s 12 days in a different key and in a different time signature—1/2, 2/2, 3/4, 4/4, 5/4, 6/8, 7/8 and so on. It’s the kind of bizarre musical challenge that the band thrives on, and yet the results had been so tuneful and accessible that the audience had willingly chimed in on the line, “Fi-i-ive go-o-olden rings.”

As he toweled off after the show, Fleck outlined his upcoming schedule. It became clear that while the Flecktones have served as Fleck’s primary musical vehicle for the past 20 years, he is moving in so many new musical directions these days that the quartet has almost become a side project. (In fact, the Flecktones’ only 2009 touring plans come with a small tour at the end of the year.)

As soon as he finished the Flecktones’ tour last winter, he recorded his new album with bassist Edgar Meyer and tabla player Zakir Hussain. Then he went back out on the road with the Sparrow Quartet, the chamber-music/old-time string band led by Fleck’s girlfriend, Abigail Washburn.

When that ended at the end of February, he went into rehearsal for his March/April tour with some of the African musicians on his new album, Throw Down Your Heart (Rounder). At the same time he had to prepare the theatrical release of the documentary film of the same name about his 2005 trip to Africa. In June and July, he will tour again with a different set of African musicians. In September and October, he’ll hit the road with Meyer and Hussain to support their album with shows as a trio and with local orchestras.

Having rattled off this schedule, Fleck seemed more tired than before. But when he talked about the prospect of playing with Hussain, Washburn and the South African singer Vusi Mahlasela, his weary grin spread wider. It was as if he couldn’t believe what he had gotten himself into but couldn’t wait to do it.

“There’s such pleasure in learning new music,” he said. “I love busting my ass and feeling like I’ve got it. It’s hard for me to turn down the opportunities that come my way.

“I’m choosing battles that I think I have a chance to win. I try to pick things that are just beyond my reach rather than things that are way beyond my reach that I’ll never grasp. If there are rhythms or melodies that I can acquire that are related to what I’m already doing, I’ll go for it. If they’re unrelated or beyond my scope, I’ll leave them alone.

“At least for the time being.”