Renée Fleming & Béla Fleck: Tiny Desk Concert

VPM | By Tom Huizenga

Published July 30, 2026 at 9:00 AM EDT

My favorite artists are the restless ones — those who enjoy, even thrive on, working outside their comfort zones, refusing to be confined to any convenient pigeonhole.

Banjo magus Béla Fleck might be the poster boy for such musical curiosity. The 18-time Grammy-winner is fluent in bluegrass, newgrass (which he helped define), jazz, rock, Indian classical and various other traditions from around the globe.

Opera superstar Renée Fleming also enjoys a boundary-defying inquisitive streak. While she’s one of the finest, most celebrated, sopranos of her generation, Fleming has stepped into surprising places, including a Super Bowl performance, recording a moody rock album sporting songs by Peter Gabriel and Tears for Fears, singing Broadway and jazz, and now, with Fleck, performing old Appalachian folk songs behind an office desk. What will she do next?

The seemingly odd bedfellows have surrounded themselves with an A-list cast of bluegrass musicians, including mandolinist and singer Sierra Hull, bassist Mark Schatz and guitarist Jake Stargel. Of special note is Michael Cleveland who, arguably, is the third singer in this band. His warm, perceptive fiddle provides commentary, harmonizes with Hull and Fleming and occasionally steps out beautifully on its own.

These songs speak of longing, of grief during war and the sturdy hope for better times to come. They may be a couple hundred years old, but they resonate today, especially in these bittersweet renditions served up by two ever curious, like-minded artists.

SET LIST

“In the Pines”
“He’s Gone Away / Storms Are On the Ocean”
“Blackest Crow”

MUSICIANS

Renée Fleming: vocals
Béla Fleck: banjo
Michael Cleveland: fiddle
Mark Schatz: bass
Sierra Hull: mandolin, vocals
Jake Stargel: guitar

TINY DESK TEAM

Producer: Tom Huizenga
Director/Editor: Maia Stern
Audio Director/Mix: Josh Newell
Host/Series Producer: Bobby Carter
Videographers: Maia Stern, Joshua Bryant, Kara Frame
Audio Engineer: Neil Tevault
Photographer: Elizabeth Gillis
Tiny Desk Team: Ashley Pointer, Felix Contreras
Series Editor: Lars Gotrich
Executive Producer: Suraya Mohamed
Executive Director: Sonali Mehta
Series Creators: Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson, Robin Hilton

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Tom Huizenga

Tom Huizenga is a producer for NPR Music. He contributes a wide range of stories about classical music to NPR's news programs and is the classical music reviewer for All Things Considered. He appears regularly on NPR Music podcasts and founded NPR's classical music blog Deceptive Cadence in 2010.

Joining NPR in 1999, Huizenga produced, wrote and edited NPR's Peabody Award-winning daily classical music show Performance Today and the programs SymphonyCast and World of Opera.

He's produced live radio broadcasts from the Kennedy Center and other venues, including New York's (Le) Poisson Rouge, where he created NPR's first classical music webcast featuring the Emerson String Quartet.

As a video producer, Huizenga has created some of NPR Music's noteworthy music documentaries in New York. He brought mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato to the historic Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, placed tenor Lawrence Brownlee and pianist Jason Moran inside an active crypt at a historic church in Harlem, and invited composer Philip Glass to a Chinatown loft to discuss music with Devonté Hynes (aka Blood Orange).

He has also written and produced radio specials, such as A Choral Christmas With Stile Antico, broadcast on stations around the country.

Prior to NPR, Huizenga served as music director for NPR member station KRWG, in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and taught in the journalism department at New Mexico State University.

Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Huizenga's radio career began at the University of Michigan, where he produced and hosted a broad range of radio programs at Ann Arbor's WCBN-FM. He holds a B.A. from the University of Michigan in English literature and ethnomusicology.

See stories by Tom Huizenga