Set list: Milestones / Y2K9 / Twin Towns / Grateful Dawg / Mill Valley Waltz / Nature Boy / Dawgology* / How Mt. Girls Can Love* / Dawg Cha Cha / Slade

By Ted Silverman

Report: 12/11/99:
Last night’s David Grisman Quintet - Bela Fleck and the Flecktone’s concert at San Francisco’s Warfield Theatre was solidly sold out and warmly received. These two bands ideally complement each other. Both bands team virtuoso soloist leaders with precision rhythm sections and highly skilled sidemen who thicken the mix with melodic invention and polyrhythmic complexity. They each have unique percussionists and highly developed and unique styles. Grisman stated early on that both he and Bela were two folks who seem to be the only ones doing what they do on their respective instruments.

The evening started with the DGQ powering through the Miles Davis tour de force, Milestones. Two new tunes followed, Y2K9 and Twin Towns, both of which the Dawg pledged would appear on the upcoming Acoustic Disc release Dawg2000. Grisman stated that Twin Towns was penned in honour of his having recently become the Grandfather of twins!

Following these fresh tastes Enrique Coria (playing a Tony Rice Santa Cruz D) ripped through Grateful Dawg with tasty licks. I enjoy Enrique’s approach but in the same sense his tone seemed tinny and lacked in the bass frequencies which may have been more of a factor of poor mixing or my proximity to the stage. (And, though he adds a wonderful element of precision and Latin flavour, I miss the guitaristic virtuosity of say, Tony Rice who could regularly incite jaw-dropping reactions from the audience. But this is not a valid comment in a performance review.)

The set continued with Mill Valley Waltz from Tone Poems 1, and the Nat King Cole chestnut Nature Boy. Grisman then introduced the next tune Dawgology as a request from Bela. Following the ensemble portion of the tune El Magnifico, Enrique Coria launched into a fiery flamenco solo and then, much to the delight of the audience, Bela Fleck popped out from the wings to trade licks with the band.

After this delightful exchange Grisman stated that next they would put aside this New Acoustic Music for some good old fashioned Bluegrass. Bela kicked it off with the taters and a vocal trio of Bela, Dawg and Joe Craven launched into How Mt.Girls Can Love, which really lit the hall up. Vocally these guys tried hard but I wouldn’t call it a Grammy-worthy performance. The real surprise is that Joe Craven added yet another significant talent to his incredible roster of skills; he’s just as adept at singing as he his at playing just about any instrument you can think of.

Bela then exited the stage with a fanfare and the band concluded their set with another new tune, Dawg Cha Cha. With warmly received applause the band was then coaxed out from the wings with to perform an encore dedicated to the late Charles Sawtelle: Slade.

At this point I certainly felt as if I had gotten my money’s worth and Bela’s set would just be icing on the cake. Hi-lights of the Flecktones performance (aside from the incredible skill of Victor Wooten) was a performance of the Grammy-winning instrumental track Almost 12 which was cast in 11/16 time(!) Grisman appeared late in the set and played a seemingly improvised duet with Bela that travelled from spacey improvisation to a ripping fiddle tune. Then they put the Dawg through his paces by having him try his luck at a tune he’d never played before, Sex in a Pan.

Bela played all sorts of interesting Banjo’s including a Mastertone, a custom Electric Deering in glowing purple, a really interesting small-headed axe with a Sitar damper built in and an extremely unusual electric guitar.

The encore was remarkable in that it was the first time I had ever seen a Bassoonist grace a stage to play anything but classical music. Paul Hanson made that bedpost really swing and he even got involved in some hot lick trading with Saxophonist Jeff Coffin during the encore of Flight of the Cosmic Hippo.

It was an extremely worthwhile evening of music that would have only been improved if it had occurred on a weekend allowing for the bands to stretch out even more. The Bill Graham / Warfield / Fillmore family poster give-away at the end of the night was an extra added bonus contributing to the good value of the evening overall.

I highly recommend these bands as in general they create, perform and produce music for an active mind.

Ted ‘Treblemaker’ Silverman. San Francisco
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1st Jan 2000