In terms of sheer musical spectacle, you can scarcely do better than Béla Fleck and the Flecktones tonight. Fronted by the best and most innovative banjo player in the world and flanked by the likes of Victor Wooten, whose bottomless bag of slap-happy licks on the bass guitar has marked him the premiere player of his own instrument, the Flecktones are in many ways the musical equivalent of the Cirque du Soleil.
You will see 15-minute drum solos, half of which may be played on Roy Future Man"" Wooten's custom-rigged over-the-shoulder drum machine and synthesizer, the ""Synth-Axe Drumitar."" Expect Jeff Coffin playing two saxophones at the same time, crafted by a cerebral cortex and powered by a set of lungs that should all be soldered together and willed to science.
However, this unique quartet is not solely about musical gimmickry. Their improvisation is fluid, complicated and thickly layered. Best of all, it spans a variety of styles including jazz, funk, bluegrass, country and pop.
The group's jam sessions often warp in and out of genres at the drop of a hat and never in a way that doesn't make sense at the time, even if it's tough to explain to your friends later. Additionally, they routinely feature instruments that had only existed in myth before the Flecktones brought them onstage.
Their musical experiments don't always work perfectly, but they never fall too hard, and when was the last time anyone watched Evel Knievel because they were sure he was going to make it across the Grand Canyon?
The Flecktones have spent the majority of the last 17 years touring, averaging around 200 shows a year, and are hot off their 2006 release Hidden Land, which won the 2007 Grammy for Best Contemporary Jazz Album.
The crowds at Béla Fleck shows are as eclectic as the musicians themselves. Béla Fleck has done the most for the banjo in the mainstream since Deliverance, and the legions of country fans that routinely make it out to see his chops haven't forgotten it. Jazz fusion connoisseurs go crazy for the Wooten brothers, and as with most other pan-genre solo heavy bands, the hippies will be out in full force.
Sure, at $32.50 it's the most pricey show of the night, but this is a must-see act, especially within the relative intimacy of the Orpheum Theater.
