Last night, I caught Belá Fleck and The Flecktones down at the Performing Arts Center in Charlottesville, VA. This is the, well, I actually don't know how many times that I've seen these guys live, but I've pretty much seen them every chance I can since 1991. They are one of my favorite jazz bands and have been for quite some time.

Tonight was the first time that I have ever been to the Performing Arts Center. I was rather surprised to learn that it was in a high school. I suppose the location would account for the exceedingly high number of rather young kids who were in the audience. Not that it's a bad thing, it just contributes towards my feeling old.

We got to the show a little late (thank you ever so much, MapQuest), so the show was already started. The crowd was rather sedate. I'm not sure how much of that can be attributed to the median age of the audience, or how much can be laid at the somewhat heavy security presense, but there wasn't a lot of energy in the crowd.

And that affected the performers. While I rather like the Flecktones and will absolutely catch the next show I can, this show didn't feel quite up to the normal Flecktones standard. Perhaps it was the fact that they had driven all night from Vermont. Maybe it's that they have been on tour with only a few months here and there off since March 1994. Possibly it was the crowd being as slack as they were. I don't know why, but I've seen shows with better energy than this before. And I know that I'll see better in the future.

Don't take this to mean that I didn't like the show; the Flecktones on a bad night are better than most bands on a good one. Vic's solo was amazing (as usual), the interaction between Futch and Belá was worth the trip. They also changed the way that the solos occurred. With the exception of Vic's solo starting off the second set, the entire band would segue into one of the musician's solo. Then one or two of the member would come back out, play with the soloist and then the rest of the band would hop in.