Victor Wooten Explained

Victor Wooten
Background:non_vocal_instrumentalist
Birth Name:Victor Lemonte Wooten
Birth Date:11 September 1964 [1]
Birth Place:Mountain Home, Idaho, U.S.
Occupation:Musician, songwriter, record producer
Instrument:Bass guitar
Years Active:1980–present

Victor Lemonte Wooten (born September 11, 1964) is an American bassist, songwriter, and record producer. He has been the bassist for Béla Fleck and the Flecktones since the group's formation in 1988 and a member of the band SMV with two other bassists, Stanley Clarke and Marcus Miller.[2] [3] From 2017 to 2019 he recorded as the bassist for the metal band Nitro.

He owns Vix Records, which releases his albums.[4] He wrote the novel The Music Lesson: A Spiritual Search for Growth Through Music.[5] [6] He later released the book's sequel, The Spirit of Music: The Lesson Continues, on February 2, 2021.[7]

Wooten is the recipient of five Grammy Awards.[8] He won the Bass Player of the Year award from Bass Player magazine three times and is the first person to win the award more than once.[8] In 2011, he was ranked No. 10 in the Top 10 Bassists of All Time by readers of Rolling Stone magazine.[9]

In 2018–2019 Wooten was diagnosed with a rare neurological condition called focal dystonia in his hands and upper body, which had been limiting his ability to play in previous years, but has since abated somewhat.[10]

Early life and career

Born to Dorothy and Elijah Wooten, Victor is the youngest of the five Wooten brothers; Regi, Roy, Rudy, and Joseph Wooten are all musicians. Regi began to teach Victor to play bass when he was two, and by the age of six, he was performing with his brothers in their family band, The Wooten Brothers Band.[11] As a United States Air Force family, they moved often when Wooten was young. The family settled in Newport News, Virginia, in 1972. Wooten graduated from Denbigh High School in 1982. While in high school, he and his brothers played in the country music venue at Busch Gardens theme park in Williamsburg, Virginia. In 1987, he traveled to Nashville, Tennessee, to visit friends that he made at the theme park. One of them was a studio engineer who introduced him to Béla Fleck, with whom he has often collaborated.[12]

In 2000, Wooten created a music program called Bass/Nature camp that was expanded into Victor Wooten's Center for Music and Nature and includes all instruments. His camps are at Wooten Woods, a 147-acre retreat in Only, Tennessee, near Nashville.[13] Wooten co-leads the "Victor Wooten/Berklee Summer Bass Workshop" at Berklee College of Music in Boston. At Berklee and his own camps, he collaborates with Berklee Bass Department chair, Steve Bailey.[14] The two bassists have been teaching together since the early 1990s.

He was featured on the May/June 2014 cover of Making Music Magazine[15] to discuss the camps.

Instruments

Wooten is most often seen playing Fodera basses, of which he has a signature model. His most famous Fodera, a 1983 Monarch Deluxe he refers to as "number 1," sports a Kahler Tremolo System model 2400 bridge. Fodera's "Yin Yang" basses (co-designed by and created for Wooten) incorporates the Yin Yang symbol—which Wooten uses in various media—as a focal point of the top's design and construction. The symbol is created from two pieces of naturally finished wood (Ebony and Holly, for example), fitted together to create the Yin-Yang pattern.[16]

As well as playing electric bass (both fretted and fretless) and the double bass, he played cello in high school. He still plays cello occasionally with the Flecktones as well as in the 2012 Sword and Stone/Words and Tones tour.[17]

Discography

See also: Bass Extremes and Vital Tech Tones.

Solo albums

As the Wootens

As Bass Extremes – with Steve Bailey [19]

As Vital Tech Tones – with Scott Henderson and Steve Smith

As SMV – with Stanley Clarke and Marcus Miller

With Béla Fleck and the Flecktones

With others

As sideman – with Mike Stern

Bibliography

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Bio . victor wooten.
  2. Web site: Phares . Heather . Victor Wooten . AllMusic . 2 September 2018.
  3. Web site: Marcus Miller News . Marcusmiller.com . 2008-06-19 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20120211080533/http://www.marcusmiller.com/news_entry.html?newsid=275&color=0 . February 11, 2012 . mdy-all .
  4. Web site: Victor Wooten Announces A Show of Hands 15. 2011-02-08. antimusic.com. 2013-12-01.
  5. Salina Journal (2010)
  6. Web site: Biography . Victorwooten.com . 2013-11-18 . https://web.archive.org/web/20100519131506/http://www.victorwooten.com/bio.html . May 19, 2010 . dead . mdy-all .
  7. Web site: The Spirit of Music. 2021-04-02. Penguin Random House Higher Education.
  8. Web site: Victor Wooten official website/biography. 2010. Official website. VixLix Music. May 27, 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20100519131506/http://www.victorwooten.com/bio.html. May 19, 2010. dead. mdy-all.
  9. News: Rolling Stone Readers Pick the Top Ten Bassists of All Time . 2011-03-31 . rollingstone.com . 2013-12-01.
  10. Web site: Interview Victor Wooten Focal Dystonia Treatment . . 2021-02-25 . 2022-02-27.
  11. News: Brodkin. Fran. The Wootens: Band of brothers grow up with music and values. 2013-11-29. Montgomery News .
  12. McDonald, Sam (February 21, 2000) "High Profile: Victor Wooten", Daily Press, Retrieved 2016-03-04
  13. News: Victor Wooten chosen in 'Rolling Stone' 'Greatest Bass Players of All Time' poll. 2011-04-07. Tennessean.com. 2013-12-01.
  14. Web site: Victor Wooten/Berklee Summer Bass Workshop | Berklee College of Music . Berklee.edu . 2016-03-04.
  15. Web site: Freddy Villano . Victor Wooten's Music and Nature Camps. Makingmusicmag.com . 2014-05-01 . 2016-03-04.
  16. Web site: Victor Wooten Yin Yang 4 String . fodera.com . 2013-12-25 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20100306035134/http://www.fodera.com/vw_yy_4.html . March 6, 2010 .
  17. Web site: Playing with Words and Music. NoTreble. October 4, 2012. 24 July 2014.
  18. Web site: The Wootens – The Wootens Releases Discogs. Discogs.
  19. Web site: Bass Extremes Discography Discogs. Discogs.

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