Punch Brothers and Béla Fleck: My Bluegrass Heart at the UB Center for the Arts

Decorative drawing of guitars with snake and foliage.

By CAS Staff

Release Date: August 10, 2022

The University at Buffalo Center for the Arts will present a special double-bill evening, “Punch Brothers and Béla Fleck: My Bluegrass Heart” on Saturday, Dec. 17, 2022 at 7:30 p.m. in the Mainstage Theatre, located at the Center for the Arts, North Campus.

The band of virtuosi that comprise Punch Brothers has spent more than a decade changing the face of acoustic music, stretching the limitations of their instruments and influencing a generation of young musicians, some of whom will appear with Béla Fleck as part of his set based on his 2022 Best Bluegrass Grammy-winning album My Bluegrass Heart. Beyond the baker’s dozen of Grammy Awards and Genius Grants between them, their collective skills bring worldly rhythms and soulful jams to the stage.

Punch Brothers are mandolinist Chris Thile, guitarist Chris Eldridge, bassist Paul Kowert, banjoist Noam Pikelny, and violinist Gabe Witcher. Their accolades include a Grammy® for Best Folk Album for their 2018 release, All Ashore, and praise from the media, including The Washington Post, which said, "With enthusiasm and experimentation, Punch Brothers take bluegrass to its next evolutionary stage, drawing equal inspiration from the brain and the heart."

Over the last four decades, Béla Fleck has made a point of boldly going where no banjo player has gone before, a musical journey that has earned him 15 Grammys in nine different fields, including Country, Pop, Jazz, Instrumental, Classical and World Music. But his roots are in bluegrass, and that’s where he returns with his first bluegrass tour in 24 years, My Bluegrass Heart.

My Bluegrass Heart is the third chapter of a trilogy which began with the 1988 album, Drive, and continued in 1991 with The Bluegrass Sessions. The project features a who’s who of some of the greatest instrumentalists in bluegrass music’s history alongside some of the best of the new generation of players.

This special concert marks both the Punch Brothers’ and Béla Fleck return to the Center for the Arts.

Tickets for "Punch Brothers and Béla Fleck: My Bluegrass Heart" are $49, $58, $62 and go on sale to the general public Friday, Aug. 12 at 10 a.m. Venue presale tickets go on sale on Thursday, Aug. 12 at 10 a.m. A limited amount of University at Buffalo student tickets are $25, must show current valid identification and purchased at the Center for the Arts Box Office.