Bassist

Over the past half-century, Béla Fleck has exploded the parameters of the banjo, taking his staggering musicality to inspired blends of bluegrass, fusion, folk, jazz, classical, global music, and more, earning a reputation as one of our most brilliant instrumentalists. In the late 1980s, he started the Flecktones, a quartet of musicians bridging bluegrass and jazz. After a decade-long hiatus, the group is reuniting for a brief tour that embraces the spirit of the season.

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Béla Fleck & the Flecktones

University of Michigan

Banjoist Béla Fleck, harmonica player and keyboardist Howard Levy, bassist Victor Wooten, and percussionist / drumitarist Roy “Future Man” Wooten have together created some of the world’s most forward-thinking music throughout their remarkable careers. Drawing from a vast array of genres—classical, jazz, bluegrass, African music, electric blues, and Eastern European folk—their sound is impossible to define. It’s a unique musical language forged by the union of four brilliant minds, each contributing something distinct to the whole. Simply put, it is The Flecktones: music that only emerges when these four musicians come together.

Béla Fleck and the Flecktones

The John Anson Ford Theatre

The Shedd welcomes five-time Grammy winner Victor Wooten and The Wooten Brothers back to Jaqua Concert Hall for another evening of their fantastic mashup of jazz, funk, soul, R&B, rock, and bluegrass.

Victor Wooten & The Wooten Brothers

The Shedd Institute

Victor Wooten & the Wooten Brothers

Ravinia Festival

For over four decades, people have recognized the Wooten Brothers as some of the most innovative musicians in existence. Further, they enjoy wide acknowledgment as one of the most talented and dynamic band of brothers the world has ever known. Thus, the brothers have always served as a musical tour-de-force, redefining the limits of jazz, funk, soul, R&B, rock and bluegrass. This tour will mark the brothers’ first time playing together since the untimely death of their saxophone-playing brother Rudy.

Dakota

Benjamin Curtin is a senior undergraduate student at Carnegie Mellon University, studying business administration at the Tepper School of Business and piano performance at the College of Fine Arts. His parents, both professional pianists, began teaching him piano at the age of 6. Ben began learning from his father, David, before spending most of his childhood and teenage years learning from his mother, Hyun Ju. He now studies under Professor Frederic Chiu, who began teaching him at CMU in 2022. In addition to piano, Ben has taught himself both bass guitar and guitar, starting at the ages of 16 and 18, respectively. Outside of school and music, Ben is a volunteer leader for Young Life College at CMU and the University of Pittsburgh. He enjoys spending quality time with friends and family, keeping himself fit, and eating lots of food.

Student Recital: Benjamin Curtin

Carnegie Mellon University

A multiple Grammy-winning legend in worlds of funk and avant garde jazz, Victor Wooten is a regular in music critics’ lists of best bass guitar players in history. In recent years, Wooten has sought to combine jazz and symphonic traditions, and La Lección Tres showcases the possibilities of a solo electric bass with orchestra, sometimes with plucked rhythmic punch and others lyrical and melodic with a custom bass that’s bowed like a cello. After opening with Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s romantic and lush Ballade, Thomas Wilkins conducts Bernstein’s timeless Symphonic Dances from West Side Story.

Bassist

Victor Wooten

Events

Past events

Nov 30, 2025

Béla Fleck & the Flecktones · University Musical Society

Aug 25, 2025

Béla Fleck and the Flecktones · The Ford

About

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