rbonotto said: walking down the main street of a Vermont town and hearing new music coming from *every* church --what could be more surreal?!

That's exactly what Stevie said. It was like a hallucination.

We're considering another in 2003 ... funding required this time. Talk more later.

Dennis

not to mention the informality of it all --what a difference to new music programs elsewhere!!! and walking down the main street of a Vermont town and hearing new music coming from *every* church --what could be more surreal?!

You know, I think some folks out there really thought that this festival was the way to become a Big Rock Star.

This was a Non-Pop festival. It was NOT held at a university during that university's semester, so there was NOT a captive audience.

Everybody who came really wanted to be there.

One elderly lady and teenage girl went to just about everything together---and neither of them had badges.

I've heard reports from the folks who attended New Music Ensembles in Oslo in the '80s---which is much friendlier to new music than any place in the USA. The audience was always the same 6 diehards.

Another model that comes to my mind for how to reconfigure such a festival in the future: go for the gold and start at, say, 2 million in basic funding; get the city to rope off a street downtown and put on the whole concert under tents outdoors, charging no admission at all but making it really easy to walk into. In Ann Arbor, every year, the visual artists do this--each is responsible for moving their own stuff and providing their own tent/roof, and the city just provides the street space---and attendance is huge. People come in from all over just to look. Businesses underwrite it because they make a load selling to tourists. Ephemeral glances at the art are just a come-on to buy fixed artifacts, and a stroll through the fair is free.
I really think that can be done with Non-Pop Music. But it also involves refusing to coddle the musicians (I brought my microphones and I wasn't even playing).

Ed---see my response back on the previous (and never yet closed) thread.

What festival were you at?

Logos came all the way from Ghent to play for 25 people with a two-bit PA, which they had to set up themselves?

Ill wind wasn't supplied with mic's?

The promised monitor speakers that everyone was banking on were not in evidence?

Just because they bit off more than they could chew is no reason to excuse such utterly unprofessional work.

And the crowds.... Not one person I met in Montpelior even knew Ought-One was going on! When we arrived @ City Center on Friday, as instructed, there were no people to meet us, to help us with tech support etc. There wasn't even a sign. In 20+ years of performing I've NEVER experienced a 'festival' like this. Sure we all got to renew aquaintences and shmooze with old friends etc. But was that the reason you went? I went to play for an audience with a decent sound system. I went to share my music with other performers, composers and non-musicians alike, not to play for a tiny audience, because the grandiose thinking split them into 4 simultaneous venues....

Please tell me where I can purchase a pair of your rose-colored glasses...

Monday morning:

Now the music has faded away, people are
scattering to the four winds, everyone has had the
experience he or she came for, our musical
knowledge has been esxtended, and we owe infinite
graditude to Dennis and David and all those who
worked in this noble cause. Now those who did the
work can bask for a bit in the glory, but let us
not forget that it is for them to pick up the
pieces. That work has just begin.....

Thanks