Not so much a review as a few thoughts/observations/whatnot.

Acts I wanted to see but didn't get around to seeing: Allez-Gator, Bernard Carney, Bruce Watson, Colum Sands, Hide 'n' Cheek, Jerry Epstein, Jugularity, Les Smokin' Gitanes, Mal Webb, Martin Pearson and the MP3, Peter Hicks, Touchwood, Trio Triplika.

Acts I saw once, but wish I had seen more of: David Francey, George Papavgeris, Margaret Roadknight, Vardos. Fortunately, I saw Francey at the Blue Mountains festival last month; mostly what I regret is that I didn't tell more of my friends at the National to make sure to see him. I saw George Papavgeris at the Budawang, Saturday afternoon, right after Dick Gaughan. GP's first song was on essentially the same topic as DG's last - the idealism of the 60s and the materialism of the present. DG's song was angry - look at how *you* have changed. GP's song was sad - look at how *we* have changed. With all due respect to DG, whom I hold in high regard, I thought GP's song was by far the better of the two.

Vardos have either gotten much better, or I just forgot since the last time I saw them how sensational they are.

A couple of other acts that just keep getting better: The Wheeze & Suck Band, and Cloudstreet.

Impressive bands I didn't know about before: Coolgrass and Tulca Mor. Coolgrass have a bluegrass lineup, and play just about everything except bluegrass (well, they do play a little bit of bluegrass). Their take-off on Time Warp (from the Rocky Horror Picture Show) has to be seen to be believed. Tulca Mor is that rarity, an Irish band without a bodhran. Thier instrumentals are pretty good, but where they stand out is in their sensational vocalist, Jenny Fitzgibbon.

Disappointments: The Wailin' Jennys. They do very nice harmonies, but I found their choice of material quite ordinary. Maybe I didn't give them enough of a chance. The Black Nonnas were fine as long as they were singing & playing, but mostly they were doing schtick, and it didn't do much for me.

The poor emcees who have to cope with all the non-English names of the acts they introduce...the one who introduced the Virmalised Estonian Folk Dancers as VIR-mal-ised, when it's actually (closer to) vir-MAL-uh-sed.

Every year at the National, there's one act that just blows me away. This year, it was someone who wasn't even in the program - a young Japanese guitarist named Naoki Jo. I saw him at the Blackboard tent on Sunday afternoon. He did things with a guitar I've never seen anybody do. I don't mean he did the things other people do, but did them better - I mean he played the guitar in a whole different way. He used the whole instrument, not just the strings, doing rapid-fire percussion on various parts of the instrument. He may be the only guitarist with calluses on his knuckles.... I can see I'm not going to be able to give a good description here of what he did - all I can say is that I sat there, not believing what I was seeing, but enjoying the entertainment tremendously. I hope you all get a chance to see him some day.