Béla Fleck is considered by many to be the premier banjo player in the world.  A New York City native, he began his musical career playing the guitar. In the early 1960's, while watching The Beverly Hillbillies, Bela was awed by the bluegrass sounds of Flatt & Scruggs, particularly Earl Scruggs's banjo style. "It was like sparks going off in my head" he later said. The banjo finally became his fulltime passion when his grandfather bought him his own instrument in 1973. At the same time, Béla entered New York City's High School of Music and Art where he began studies on the French horn but was soon demoted to the chorus due to inadequate skills. With no banjo instruction available, Bela sought lessons beyond school, studying with Erik Darling, Marc Horowitz, and Tony Trischka, and joining a band, "Wicker's Creek.”  Attending a concert by "Return to Forever," Bela was further inspired to continue his experiments with bebop and jazz on the banjo.

 

Right out of high school, Fleck moved to Boston to play with Jack Tottle's Tasty Licks, making two albums with the band before releasing his own solo debut, Crossing the Tracks in 1980. Here he also first played with future partners Sam Bush and Jerry Douglas. With the break up of Tasty Licks, Bela moved to Lexington, KY to form Spectrum with bassist Mark Schatz, touring for about a year and recording Natural Bridge (1981) with David Grisman, Mark O'Connor, and Ricky Skaggs.  In 1982, Fleck joined the progressive bluegrass band New Grass Revival, charting new territory over five albums with their blend of bluegrass, rock and country music, and exposing the bluegrass/acoustic music world to the wonders of Béla Fleck.

 

In 1988, after meeting Howard Levy at the Winnipeg Folk Festival, Fleck put together the band that became the genre-busting Flecktones, initially for a single concert on PBS’ Lonesome Pine Special. With Levy, bassist Victor Wooten and percussionist/drumitarist Roy Wooten, the Flecktones became one of the most innovative and popular ensembles of the day, continuing as a trio when Levy left, returning to a quartet with the addition of saxophonist Jeff Coffin, winning five Grammies in various categories. When Coffin moved on to the Dave Matthews Band in 2008, Levy returned, and the original Flecktones were back touring and recording.

 

Fleck has continued to have a musical life beyond the Flecktones, working over the years with Edgar Meyer, Zakir Hussein, Toumani Diabte, the Nashville Symphony and more; touring with a trio including Jean-Luc Ponty and Stanley Clarke; and recording and touring with Chick Corea (Enchantment). And now, of course, recording and touring with the Marcus Roberts Trio. 
 

Not as prolific as a recording artist compared to many of his generation, pianist Marcus Roberts has nonetheless been busy as a performer, composer, arranger, bandleader and educator.  The winner of the 1987 Thelonious Monk International Piano Competition, protégé of Wynton Marsalis, and one of the most eloquent and knowledgeable spokesman for classical jazz repertoire, Roberts has led his acclaimed trio for more than 15 years;  established his own J-Master label; and has been teaching and nurturing a new generation through his faculty appointment at Florida State University.

A native of Jacksonville raised in the musical traditions of the Baptist Church, Marcus Roberts lost his sight at age 5. His mother, also blind and a gospel singer, first taught him to play piano at age 8, and he was soon playing weekly in church. More formal training followed at age 12, giving him a solid classical foundation.  However, hearing Ellington, Benny Goodman and Mary Lou Williams on the radio turned him on to jazz, while hearing gospel music through his church infused his music with plenty of soul. A classical music major at Florida State University, Roberts studied with the highly regarded concert artist, Leonidas Lipovetsky, devouring Braille scores from the Library of Congress.  “I always had this interest in a combination of extreme dignity, virtuosity and musical integrity,” he said, “but mixed with this human feeling that might cover...thousands of years.” Hence Roberts has been as comfortable with Ravel and Brahms as with Jelly Roll Morton, Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk, and has devoted himself to studying the history of the music.

Still at FSU, Roberts won the young artist's competition at the 1982 National Association of Jazz Educators annual conference, then the following year won the Great American Piano Competition. At 21, he began a six-year stint touring and recording with Wynton Marsalis, during which time he won the Monk Competition and signed his first major recording contract with BMG. After a series of releases for BMG, he signed on to Columbia in 1994, initiating a wide-ranging repertoire of solo piano, duets, and trio arrangements of jazz standards as well as original works for trio, large ensembles and symphony orchestra. He earned a Grammy nomination for his 1996 recording of George Gershwin's “Rhapsody in Blue” (Portraits in Blue) with symphony orchestra and jazz band.

Roberts formed his famed trio in the mid-90s, with a 17-year-old Jason Marsalis on drums and soon the addition of bassist Roland Guerin. Now, with bassist Rodney Jordan, the  trio continues to be a sterling example of true collaboration among three musicians. And throughout his career, Marcus Roberts’ repertoire has drawn on the history of jazz, from Fats Waller to Ellington to Monk to Coltrane and beyond. Known for reviving classical works, Roberts notes that his ultimate goal is “to come up with something different, something new that didn’t exist before... Every time I sit down to the piano, I draw spontaneously from as much of the history of great music as I have at my fingertips,” he says. “That's why I never stop studying great music. It just gives me more to draw on in my improvisations." His studies also inspire original compositions, including numerous suites of music, such as "Romance, Swing, and the Blues", "Deep in the Shed", "Time and Circumstance", "In Honor of Duke", "From Rags to Rhythm", and "The Sound of the Band.” Roberts has received various commissioning awards, including ones from Jazz at Lincoln Center, Chamber Music America, ASCAP, and the North Carolina Association of Jazz Educators.  

Now on the faculty of his alma mater, Roberts has long been committed to passing on the legacy of jazz to a new generation, including past students Marcus Printup, Nicholas Payton, Ronald Westray, Roland Guerin and Jason Marsalis. For Roberts, “when you teach people it forces you to stay on top of what you're saying because you've got to be able to communicate it in a way that they can use the information...and it's a good feeling when you hear somebody else play and make a breakthrough because of a concept that you showed them."

Memphis native Rodney Jordan grew up playing bass in church and high school ensembles. While studying jazz at Jackson State University (MS), he also played in area symphony orchestras, later settling in Atlanta where he taught bass and became an active participant in the local jazz scene. He moved on to a faculty position at Florida State University where he met Marcus Roberts, joining the trio in 2009. Says Roberts, “He comes to swing every night. He is a virtuosic musician with a lot of soul in his playing and every time I hear him, he seems to get better.”

The youngest son of Ellis Marsalis, Jason Marsalis started on drums at age 3 although his formal music education (on violin) started two years later. At 6 he began studies with drummer Jim Black, and at 12 decided to focus exclusively on drums. He went on the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts and Loyola University. A founding member of Los Hombres Caliente, Marsalis began his association with Marcus Roberts in 1987 when he was only 10, and at 17 became a regular part of Roberts’ trio. He’s appeared on all of Roberts’ trio recordings as well as on three of his own as leader. Over the past decade, Marsalis has performed more often on vibraphone as well as drum kit.

Across the Imaginary Divide (2012, Rounder Records) brings the seemingly divergent directions of Fleck and Roberts together as if it was always meant to be: The music, all composed by either Fleck or Roberts, has as wash of bouncy bluegrass twang (“Some Roads Lead Home,” “Petunia”), nods to the blues (“One Blue Truth”), hints of gypsy swagger (note Jordan’s dancing arco work) melded to a cartoonish soundtrack (“Let’s Go”), touches of Crescent City roots music (the title track and “I’m Going to Tell You This Story One More Time”), even Latin sway in ragtime (“That Ragtime Feeling”),  but the rhythms and harmonies are right out of swing and bebop, perhaps most notably on “The Sunshine and the Moonlight,” which showcases Jordan’s walking chops, and “That Old Thing,” which seems to come right out of the Great American Songbook… with banjo.

You can cross this “imaginary divide” at the Dakota on October 17-18, sets at 7 and 9 pm each evening. Reservations recommended at 612-332-5299 or www.dakotacooks.com

The Dakota Jazz Club is located at 1010 Nicollet Mall in downtown Minneapolis.