The Sun smiled warmly on the cluster of musicians, surrounded by a circle of excited spectators tapping their toes to a breakneck rendition of "Rollin' in My Sweet Baby's Arms". They didn't need to know each other to play beautifully and flawlessly, laying out or coming in when called upon and after each verse joining in the chorus in perfect harmony.

They all knew their parts because they'd all heard The Bluegrass Boys sing and pick it. Maybe they'd sat like I did as a kid, ear to the record player for hours, listening over and over to the licks, the riffs, the nuances until we could play it just like Monroe, or Scruggs, or Watson, or any of those we chose as gurus of our instrument.

When the rat-a-tat-tat of the fiddle signaled the end of the song they all burst into laughter because it was sooo good, so clean.

We laughed because for those of us who remembered, the thrill of the sixties rattled our bones and the common thread of this music called us back here forty years later to the Washington Square Third Annual Bluegrass and Old Timey Reunion.

There were a hundred, maybe more of us, laughing, chatting, schmoozing in the shadow of the Washington Square Arch, heading off in little groups of threes and fours to find a relatively quiet bench to recall tunes we'd shown each other decades ago.

Some of us are lucky to still live near enough to play together.

Others, like me, hopped a plane to be here to reexcite that spark and feed the musical flame which burns still in our hearts.

We laughed when we looked at each others' name tags and said, "My God! Nagler! Is that you?"

We laughed when someone approached, wrinkled, bearded and bald, and showed us a picture of us playing together during some ancient summer of love, apple-cheeked faces filled with the exuberant glee of youth.We laughed when we recalled that party, or that girl, or that fateful evening after a concert when everyone decided to form a group and became famous for fifteen minutes.

The Square on a Sunday is a noisy place, with drummers, street actors, jugglers and clowns gathering audiences on the fly. But it

big enough to accommodate us all, and we certainly stood out, with our grey beards and Gibson banjoes, joy shining through our wrinkles.

I was stopped by a young couple with wide eyes who asked what was going on, this odd party of high folk where music was the only cocktail served. I explained this was what we did as kids in the sixties, that the Internet had connected us again, and that now we come together one Sunday at the end of summer to relive a time of joy from our youth. And I told them I hoped when they were my age they had something like this to return to.