Tredegar Town (Conductor: Ian Porthouse) -

Mysterious to open - lovely muted textures and wonderful sop.

Wow - wonderful ensemble. There's some fantastic textures here. Not without uncomfortable moments of tuning in top octaves.

Fantastic percussion. Some frailties through the quieter sections, but the tutti sounds are absolutely huge.

Beautiful sounds in the quieter textures - lovely cornet and euphonium.

Into the agitato the clarity is brilliant, such purpose of line and material. The odd blemish but such rhythmic security,

Maybe this swing section just isn't to be - it's felt quite constrained in all of the performances today.

Fantastic sounds and lines in the chorale - this is a huge band sound and so well managed by Porthouse.

Brilliant lines in cornets are countered well with full sonority in lower band, which leads to a jubilant (if fast) finale - and an extremely strong end.

I think this could well be up there today - but perhaps a few too many slips to make the very top.