I think the Flecktones are a mixture of acoustic and electronic music with a lot of roots in folk and bluegrass as well as funk and jazz.

I think it is very ironic that most people think that the banjo is a southern white instrument. It came from Africa and even for the first years that white people played banjo they would put on blackface.

There is a tendency to want to isolate a little bit, from people that might look at me from a fan position, because it's hard to be a real person around them, and I really want that when I'm not out on tour and in that sort of public eye.

I learned that I'm so busy with what I'm doing, so focused on what I'm doing, that I miss a lot of opportunities for interacting with people.

There's a lot of hip-hop that would be great with a banjo in it. It would just groove like crazy, and I hope I get to be one of the guys who does that, because it's coming. It's coming.

And then Earl Scruggs comes along and transforms the banjo into a virtuosic modern instrument. For the first time, the Southern banjo style becomes the identity of the banjo, and everything from before is wiped off of people's consciousness by the power of that explosion.

I doubt anybody would have pushed me [on the music]. When I was at Sony nobody ever gave me any creative suggestions on the music.