>Why not use derived tables instead of intermediate cursors?

That's what I tried first, and it works in VFP proper, but seems to be a bit complicated for the VfpOleDb driver. In metacode, like this:

SELECT distinct {fieldlist from three tables}
	from table1 
	join table2 on {expr1} and {expr2}
	LEFT JOIN table3 cc ON {expr3}
	LEFT JOIN table3 dd on  {expr4}
	LEFT JOIN table3 ee on  {expr5}
	left join (SELECT  {fieldlist2};
			FROM t_table1;
			JOIN table4 ON  {expr6};
			join (select max(datefield) as startdate, etc... group by ....) r2 ;
				on  {expr7};
			join table2  {expr1} and  {expr7};
			WHERE  {expr8};
		union SELECT  {similar except some of the logical expressions are different}) as part2 on {expr9};
        where {expr10}