Hamid Drake/Gerry Hemingway — Very odd pairing. Hemingway is usually such a subtle player, but Hamid brought the beast out in him. Even got him playing an African drum and yelling. Dense, good. Polwechsel — Maybe my favorite set of the fest. Unbelievable restraint. Gorgeous. I was talking to John Butcher later and telling him that my band (The ADD Orchestra, new release “Little Pig Nose” available on Batterrie Records – HA!) have tried playing prolonged, quiet improvisers, and that I find it really difficult to not push it. He said “I find it nearly impossible.” Satoko Fujii/Tatsuya Yoshida — we’ve already talked about. But just great. Might be my choice for the cd release out of the fest. Fujii paying incredibly close attention, and great to hear Yoshida in an accoustic setting. Aki Takase/Konrad Bauer — OK, so I stayed up until about 5 every night there, and at some point you got to catch up a little. Everyone raved about the solo trombone piece, though, which sounded to me like warm-up exercises. Keith Tippett’s Tapestry “First Weaving” — I don’t really know Tippett’s stuff. I know everyone else does, but I don’t. I love Maggie Nichols, though, and she had a very nice prolonged segment that bowed to Marlene Dietrich. Overall, there were parts I liked, and parts that made it difficult to remember that there were parts I liked. If you want to stay on my good side, not singing about marigolds is probably a good idea. The Necks. I love The Necks. Their stuff really is quite diverse, despite the formulaic set-up (simple riff, evolve slowly over 45-60 minutes, fade). This time they worked up quite a fury. Just the strength and stamina the bassist and pianist have is astounding. Playing the same thing loudly over and over is not as easy as it sounds. _________________________________________________________________ Join the world’s largest e-mail service with MSN Hotmail. http://www.hotmail.com