Cherokee should get more attention. Its gui config might put some hardcore users off at first, but it works well and Cherokee offers a lot of functionality in a nicely constructed package. In addition, it appears to run every bit as fast as nginx in my completely informal testing. Worth a look.

I've worked with Apache, nginx, and Cherokee and I think that Cherokee is the best. The authors have worked hard to make it fast and robust. I agree with jonesy that the gui might be a putoff, but I have actually come to enjoy the gui interface and love the elegant simplicity of it.