Cultural reflections

Where’s a banjo player who’s fluent in Chinese most likely to turn up?

A string quartet, of course.

Fans who heard Abigail Washburn perform in the old-time outfit Uncle Earl know that the banjo standout has an affinity for music that gets to the heart of a culture. In her Sparrow Quartet, which performs tonight at the Paramount Theater, Washburn and her colleagues are right at home in a creative blend of bluegrass, folk and chamber music that replaces rigid notions of repertoire and genre with a willingness to listen to a world of influences, and to each other.

Washburn will be sharing the stage with banjo legend Bela Fleck, cellist Ben Sollee and fiddler Casey Driessen.

“We’re going to play our hearts out,’’ Washburn said.

Washburn’s ability to speak Chinese fluently helps build connections with new listeners.

“It is an icebreaker,’’ Washburn said last week while taking a break during the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. “It turns us from being a foreign novelty act into sort of a friend.’’

The quartet’s making new friends all the time. Last fall, members became the first U.S. musicians to tour Tibet on a government-sponsored cultural mission. And the group is heading back to China to perform at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

Ask her how she came up with the quartet’s eclectic blend of instruments, and she replies, “I keep blaming China for it.’’

The cross-cultural journey began when Washburn was blazing a different trail — as the first East Asian studies major at Colorado College.

“It really happened because I was in college and needed some language credits,’’ she said.

Washburn ended up taking her first Chinese language classes in Shanghai, China. She had looked forward to the trip, but admits that, at first, “I wasn’t crazy about it.’’

She came home determined to learn more about Chinese culture and find a way to bridge perceptions about Americans that she found frustrating on that first trip.

“I got really deep in Chinese culture and language and music,’’ Washburn said.

She lived and worked in China for a while, and her Chinese friends kept asking questions about Americans and life in the United States. Washburn needed an easy, portable, accessible way to share some of what she loved about American culture with her new friends.

That’s when Washburn began to study the banjo.

“It was China that led me back to America and American music,’’ she said.

The whole experience has been one of sharing, which can be heard on the CD “Abigail Washburn and the Sparrow Quartet,’’ released in May on the Nettwerk label.

Washburn describes the song “Taiyang Chulai’’ in the CD’s liner notes as “traditional Chinese folk song from Sichuan that I learned off a cab driver in Beijing.’’

On some of the tracks, such as “Great Big Wall of China’’ and “Sugar and Pie,’’ Washburn wrote the lyrics and the four quartet members wrote the music together. Seeking other performers willing to head to China to perform and absorb new influences raised some eyebrows in traditional music circles in the States.

“When I first moved to Nashville, people would say, ‘Good luck, girl — China and the banjo,’ ’’ Washburn said with a chuckle.

But when she wanted to head back to China in 2005 to perform, Sollee, Fleck and Driessen volunteered to go.

“I knew it wasn’t me alone,’’ she said.

Her colleagues bring their own desire to bridge cultures using music.

Fleck, who has performed in Charlottesville many times, has explored music from many cultures — most recently Africa. The 10-time Grammy Award winner recently recorded and filmed a documentary, “Throw Down Your Heart,’’ after exploring the rich history of the banjo.

Driessen picked up a Grammy nod of his own in 2007 for best country instrumental performance for “Jerusalem Ridge,’’ a track on his debut CD, “3D.’’ He’s known as an innovative fiddler and composer who fluidly crosses musical boundaries, and tonight he’ll be performing on a five-string fiddle. Sollee blends solid classical chops with a reverence for roots music, and his performance style takes cues from fiddling in its three-finger plucking and bow work. He has toured and recorded with blues star Otis Taylor. “Learning to Bend,’’ his new CD, was released last week.