Interview: Victor Wooten
In most families, being a keyboardist and backup vocalist for The Steve Miller Band would make you the talk of the Thanksgiving table. Among the Wootens, it’s enough to get second billing against your little brother.
But the little brother in question — Victor Wooten, the five-time Grammy-winning bassist and founding member of Béla Fleck and the Flecktones — is quick to say that there’s no sense of jealousy between him and Joseph Wooten. Nor is there a rivalry with Roy “Futureman” Wooten, the innovative percussionist and fellow Flecktone, or with Regi Wooten, a highly respected guitarist and music teacher.
“Our parents would not have any of us fighting; even arguing wasn't allowed,” Victor says. “I like to say that my brothers never beat me up — they held me up. They still do that.”
The four siblings are now gearing up to showcase their bond as The Wooten Brothers, the family band they first formed in 1969 when Victor was just five years old. The group’s U.S. tour passes through Asheville at The Grey Eagle Outpost on Sunday, Oct. 1, and a new album is scheduled for early 2024.
Victor spoke with Asheville Stages by phone from Nashville while heading to his final day of rehearsal with the band before the tour. The conversation has been lightly edited for concision.
Daniel Walton: Until now, the only album you've released with your brothers is The Wootens from 1985, the earliest entry in your personal discography. When you go back and listen to that album now, what memories come to mind?
Victor Wooten: We learned a lot through that experience. In a sense, it doesn’t really sound like our record. It sounds like the big-time producer’s [Kashif, best known for his work with Whitney Houston and Evelyn “Champagne” King] record. But it was a good experience, and we’re better because of it. Now, many, many years later, we’re finally putting our sound out there.
DW: What makes right now the time to cut another album?
VW: We’re all getting older, and while I really can’t speak for everyone, I think we’ve satisfied pretty much every aspect of our musical careers — except the main thing that we feel like we were all born to do, which is play together as The Wooten Brothers.
My whole life, we’ve performed as The Wooten Brothers. But for some reason, when we did this big-time record with Arista Records, they changed our name to The Wootens. That record is the only time we’ve ever gone by The Wootens, so now we’re doing it under our terms, putting it out on our own label.
DW: You’ve been describing the upcoming record as a mix of old, archival tracks and new tracks. How much is old, and how much is new?
VW: It’s going to be about half and half, if things stay as planned. We ended up finding sets of recordings from many, many years ago that have our saxophone-playing brother Rudy, who we unfortunately lost in 2010. He played two saxophones at once, like the jazz great Rahsaan Roland Kirk.
We really wanted to introduce the world to Rudy, because most people don’t know him. But we also wanted to bring about the current Wooten Brothers, that sound. We’re going to do both!
DW: Can you tell me more of the story of how you came across those old recordings?
VW: It was somewhere around the beginning of the [COVID-19] pandemic. I got a Facebook message from a gentleman who said, “I used to work for Don Kirshner.” Back in the ‘70s, there was an incredible TV show called Don Kirshner's Rock Concert that would come on once a week at night and play some of the greatest music from bands live. Sort of like Dick Clark’s American Bandstand, but in a sense even better, because there were no dancers; it was just all about bands and music.
Don Kirshner had heard about us five brothers, when we were quite a bit younger, and he sent a couple of guys to our house to scout these kids. So this guy contacts me, and he’s describing our house, and I know it’s true because I remember it! I was really young, and I’d forgotten about it.
The thing that blew me away, he said, “I still have the demo tape cassette that your mom gave me.” And I went, “Oh my goodness.” We did get that cassette tape, and once it jogged our memory, we were able to find the reels of tape that the cassette came from. So we were able to get the music off the reels of tape in a better quality.
In that process, we actually found two different sets of music that we had recorded, including one we did in the early ’80s at a real recording studio. There’s a whole lot of music that is ready for the world to hear — it’s better than just us jamming in the garage.
DW: These are some very old recordings, done well before you and your brothers developed into the musicians you are today. Do you hear any connective tissue between those archival recordings and what you're doing now?
VW: Absolutely, because it’s us! It’s sort of like hearing your voice as a kid: You say, “Oh, that is me.” We had some great ability when we were young, and we still have that ability. We may have even been more raw, not following the rules. We were writing all kinds of crazy harmonies, all five of us singing. In one of them, I’m probably in the fifth grade or something like that.
To go ahead and be brash and bold, you’ll say, “Wait a minute: You guys were this young and sounding like this? Singing and writing all original music?” And we’ll say, “Yeah!” I think people are going to be blown away.
DW: In many ways, this tour and album are dedicated to Rudy’s memory. How would you describe his playing as a saxophonist? What was it like to hear him?
VW: When we were younger, the aunt of the film director Spike Lee, Consuela Lee Morehead, was a great jazz pianist who taught at a college that Regi, Roy, and Rudy went to. I don’t remember if Rudy was in high school or his first year in college, but Consuela, at that time, was saying Rudy is ready for New York right now. He played at such a high level that she said he could be living and gigging in New York City. That was always the pinnacle of your musicianship, especially for jazz.
I'm growing up as a kid — I'm five years old when we started gigging — and I'm gigging with some of the world's best musicians. I'm sleeping in the same room with two of them, and on the other side of a wall are two more.
One of the main things I’ve always wanted to do is bring this to the world. I want people to see how I got the chance to grow up.
DW: I understand that Rudy struggled with mental illness for many years, as featured in the 1991 documentary Quiet Storm. Can you share more about that part of his life and what it meant to your family?
VW: For me, all it means is that this is a person who doesn't think normal. For me, when I look at the world, I say, “If the world is run by normal-thinking people, tell me someone who's crazy.” That’s who I want to hang out with, because the normal thing is not really working too well.
Rudy did struggle to keep it together. And it was at a time in the ‘70s and ‘80s where — like with the great Jaco Pastorius, who had a mental illness — it seemed like the medical system wasn’t quite as up to date as it is now in knowing how to care for it. It took a while to figure it out.
Once Rudy’s medication got right in the late ‘80s to ‘90s, he was able to be stable, and we were able to do some playing together. But by that time, Joseph was with Steve Miller, I was with Béla Fleck, and because of a bad record deal in the early ‘80s, we weren’t playing together as a five-piece band as usually as we had growing up. We were a little bit scattered.
DW: You’ve gone from being the youngest of five brothers to being a father of four. I’m curious if there are parts of your own childhood that you’re trying to replicate for your children.
VW: Really, the only thing I'm trying to replicate for my kids that I had is just being good people. That was No. 1 for our parents. They wanted to make sure that we were good people, because at that point, it doesn't matter what you do.
But I also know the benefits in life of being musical as a child. There are studies now that show how kids that learn music do better academically, and that they learn how to sit and listen and be in groups. There’s only upsides from music.
Our parents, once we found music, helped us keep it. They've supported us ever since I've been born, and I know that they were supporting my older brothers even before I was born. I want the same for my kids. They don't need to grow up and be professional musicians, but I think every child should have music in their life.
DW: Given what I know of your spiritual side and the importance of nature to your personal practice, I'm wondering what connection you might have with Asheville as a place.
VW: Yeah, I have a lot of friends up there. Some of my nature friends and nature teachers that have taught me a lot of things about the outdoors, how to listen to the birds and track animals, some of them are in Asheville. My friend Richard Cleveland actually teaches classes up in the mountains in and around Asheville, and people can find him at LoveTheEarth.com.
DW: Is there anything I haven’t asked about that you’d like to shout out or plug?
VW: Make sure people don’t miss the show! We’re feeling really good. Everybody’s happy and healthy and playing at their height. It’s going to be really great.
But also next year for me will be my 25th year of running my music and nature camps. People can check that out on my website, VictorWooten.com. They can also check out the camps site at VixCamps.com. Hopefully by Thanksgiving or Christmas, we’ll have next year’s schedule up — it’s going to be a big year for our 25th!
IF YOU GO
Who: Victor Wooten & The Wooten Brothers with Rebirth Brass Band
When: Sunday, Oct. 1, 5 p.m.
Where: The Grey Eagle Outpost, 521 Amboy Rd., thegreyeagle.com
Tickets: $32 advance/$70 VIP
(Photos by Steve Parke)
