Crossroads
Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008
I was watching the 2007 Crossroads Guitar Festival DVD the other night and while the entire concert is fantastic I was struck by both Jeff Beck and the bass guitar player backing him up, 22 year old Tal Wilkenfeld from Australia. Anne said “she must be someone’s 15 year old daughter” but in fact, she’s just one of the hot, young bass players on the scene playing with a huge range of top flight musicians.
While scanning around on YouTube on a bass hunt I came across an incredible clip of my favorite bass player, Victor Wooten playing with Bela Fleck and the Flecktones doing a duo with Jeff Coffin with his brother Roy backing them up. Incredible playing on both of their parts and while this is less fitting for Crossroads I’m amazed that this stellar group has never been at that event.
Scanning further I found another clip of Wooten and the Flecktones playing one of my favorite songs from their Bela Fleck and the Flecktones - Live at the Quick DVD. These guys are so good, even while doing improv that it blows my mind. I’ve watched this DVD so many times I’ve lost count. The bassoonist Paul Hanson running his bassoon through an effects machine kills me every time as does Coffin’s playing.
Damn, this stuff is good. Happy New Year.
The first video I have seen before and never put two and two together. Fantastic redo of a classic!
Maybe I’ll have to save up some cash and go to the 2008 event. That would be FUN with all caps. Thanks for posting these Richard. Made my first day back in the office a cheery one.
Greg: If you go to the event, well, it would be fun, what can I say. However, as one who’s been to a lot of live concerts over the years (big ones in stadiums) I must say the videos sure are nice. You get to see things you can’t see at a live event and if they’re well produced you can run them through a nice sound system… Still, for a guitar player like you the “Guitar Village” at this event would be worth it alone.
Wonder where the next one will be?
The guitar village would be the reason to go, at least for me. I took a ‘quick’ look at the site for 2007 but didn’t see anything listed yet for 2008.
Maybe it will be on the east coast… we can go with cameras and long lenses (we’ll need ‘em) and have some fun.