I try to come over for the festival every year--have only missed one since 1996--,leaving tomorrow for the UK-- and the prom scene is absolutely magical and unique in all the world, I'm sure. Some of my best experiences in Sidmouth have been with people I've just run into on the prom and the music is just amazingly varied and vastly different from anything in the US. But one of the best aspects is its variety, and that is hindered by an amplified group of any kind, which thereby has an unfair advantage. Some of the amplified music can be so loud as to interfere with other activities, such as the York and Faulkner nightly sing. For what it's worth, I'm strongly for keeping it all acoustic.