YORKSHIRE'S best bands converged on Bradford for the most important weekend in the region's brass band calendar.

St George's Hall was packed as 58 bands competed over two days in five sections for the honour of being crowned the Yorkshire Champion Brass Band and to try and secure a place at the National Championships of Great Britain.

And tonight the top section Championship winners were revealed as Carlton Main Frickley Colliery with Grimethorpe Colliery runners-up. Rothwell Temperance were placed third with Black Dyke fourth and Brighouse & Rastrick fifth.

Brighouse & Rastrick and current British Open champions Black Dyke automatically go through to the Championship Section Finals of the National Championships at the Royal Albert Hall in London in October because of their performance at last year's National Championships.

An appreciative audience travelled from across the whole of Great Britain, Ireland and Europe to witness the closely fought contest in Bradford.

There were 13 bands competing in the Championship section on Sunday, performing The Torchbearer by Peter Graham - the City of Bradford Brass Band was in it for the first time and the adjudicators tasked with proclaiming the ultimate winner were Nigel Boddice MBE and Dr Graham Jones MBE.

Daniel Clough, 12, went home with a big smile from the weekend and the prize for best cornet player, his band BD1 was winner of the fourth section which sees them through to representing Yorkshire in the Lower Section Finals of the National Championships in September at the Centaur Centre at Cheltenham.

Bands competing in Saturday's Third Section included Clifton and Lightcliffe Senior Band and Crofton Silver Band who performed Philp Sparke's Evolution, Five States of Change.