Very nice critique Greg, ditto. To add to some of your points. I've been to the festival since the beginning & besides a slack period in the mid 80's & some medical R&Rs, I've been to most. Both Friday & Saturday nite pub session went until the doors needed to be shut around 2am & Saturday nite it carried over to the YTB & went strong until about 4am. It may have happened before but I've never seen it & both nites to boot. I also notice more younger folks joining in the festival & not all of them were S.S.Chanteens. Adding them was a shot in the arm, new blood.

Charlie, it was at the "All Hands" concert where we were dogged down. Actually I led the dog by lease on stage, he was very good accompaniment, don't ya think. His snore sounded better than my bark.

Yes Jon your CD's are better than food & I'm glad I saved & that you had the foresight to have a friend have extras on hand. I've manned the CD sales for a number of years & it's a problem every year & Charlie don't put it all on the performers.

"so that people whose stock sold out early had a chance to resupply but there was no limit on what could be initially sent".

When something doesn't work try a different approach & it hasn't worked well for years. When a teacher says the kids all flunked the test, it's time for the teacher to review how they're teaching to the kids, not that the performers are kids but they do have what you might call a different type of business style, hell if they were great business people they wouldn't be performing for all of us, the least we could do is make it just a bit easier for the to make a living. The folks that want their CD's get upset when they can't buy (see above) & the performers don't eat as well if they can't sell.

I'd also like to say a special "cheers" to the demonstration crews & especially to Mary Kay & crew, Don Sineti & David Littlefield. It's been a number of years since I've watched the shipboard workshops & demonstrations & I forgot how they make it so interesting & exciting for the crowd to watch & work the ships boat, lines, sails, capstans & pumps to song, not to mention how easy they make it for the singers, it certainly lends to the full experience, not what you'd get at many of the other festivals.

Barry