Victor Wooten

Victor Lemonte Wooten (born 11 September 1964) is an American bassist, songwriter and record producer. He has been the bassist of Béla Fleck and the Flecktones since the group was formed in 1988, and was a member of the bass supergroup SMV (2008–2009), alongside two other bassists, Stanley Clarke and Marcus Miller. From 2017 to 2019, he recorded as the bassist of the metal group Nitro.

He owns the label Vix Records, which releases his albums. He is the author of the novel The Music Lesson : A Spiritual Search for Growth Through Music. He subsequently published its sequel, The Spirit of Music : The Lesson Continues, on 2 February 2021.

Wooten has received five Grammy Awards. He has won the Bass Player magazine award for bassist of the year three times, and he is the first person to have won this award more than once. In 2011, he was ranked number 10 in the Rolling Stone readers' Top 10 of the greatest bassists of all time.

In 2018–2019, Wooten was diagnosed with focal dystonia, a rare neurological condition affecting his hands and upper body, which limited his ability to play in the preceding years, but which has since partly eased.