And I'll be there as well, after a four-year absence. The last year I was there, Paul Mills was on the teaching staff. As I watched him perform his concert on the Woods stage one evening that week, it never dawned on me that a scant four years later we would be a full-fledged duo, sharing one of the most exciting adventures of our musical lives.

I'm feeling reflective and emotional about this duo tonight because we've just come off a weekend of back-to-back concerts and eight months of writing music together. We've almost completed our second duo CD, which is loaded with songs I've written and songs we've hammered out together.

Tonight we wrote our thank-you notes for the CD booklet, and that exercise has left me sitting here filled with gratitude - to Paul, to fate, and to the creative process.

Tomorrow I start a week of jamming with eighty of my dearest friends.

Life is good.

Balladeer