Béla Fleck: Throw Down Your Heart

Béla Fleck has established himself as the most inventive and accomplished banjo player since Earl Scruggs. Although he is best known for his contributions to the “newgrass” style and for his adventurous, genre-warping work with his band, the Flecktones, this fascinating documentary finds him heading for Africa, where his instrument originated. Director Sascha Paladino accompanied him to Uganda, Tanzania, the Gambia, and Mali, chronicling Fleck's musical meetings (many of which were recorded on a laptop) with a variety of local musicians—most of whom, ironically, had never seen a banjo. The results are about as far as you can get from what Fleck calls “the white Southern stereotype” associated with the banjo. In the Ugandan village of Nakisenyi, Fleck accompanies several villagers playing an enormous marimba, creating a loud, driving sound as others sing, clap, and play wood blocks. In Tanzania, he jams with folks playing the kalimba, or thumb piano, and the result is joyful and melodic. In Dar es Salaam, Tanzania's largest city, he sits in with an electric band with a kind of loping Afro-Cuban sound, while in the Gambia he joins a fellow who plays a long-necked, three-stringed instrument called the akonting, a distant relative of the banjo. In every case, the music is infectious, the rhythms both lilting and propulsive, and the interaction between the musicians natural and intuitive. DVD extras include audio commentary, bonus scenes and musical performances, and a filmmaker biography. Highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (S. Graham)