I had the great pleasure of attending MERLEFEST 2001 in North Carolina and spent four unbelievable days at what is now considered the world's premier acoustic music event. The best Bluegrass, Cajun and Celtic musicians were doing their thing in this beautiful spot in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The festival was attended by some 70 000 people. I got to meet many of my musical heroes and attended some interesting picking workshops and competitions. The standard of playing was just awesome. A nineteen year old youngster from just over the hill blew everyone away with some mind-blowing flat picking and of course won first prize which was a beautiful Galagher Guitar.

I also had some wonderful jam sessions with pickers from all over the world. You would sit down in an instrument vendor's tent, grab a guitar off the rack, start playing it and within five minutes you would have a back-up guitarist, mandolin player and fiddler playing with you. After about an hour we would all have a good laugh, introduce ourselves and move to another venue and start the process all over again.

Here are some pics: