Two warm summer nights and music to suit all tastes combined to make Maldon's fifth PROM FANTASIA 99 a soaraway hit.

Although audience figures at Saturday evening's pop concert were down on last year, organisers, Maldon District Council, say it allowed more room for the 7,000 who attended to enjoy themselves.

Community and leisure service manager, Avril Spencer, hailed the two-day event as another success story. She said everything went without hitch.

She commented: "Last year's combination of Hot Chocolate and their Full Monty title song brought in 9,000 spectators and we sold out, but many felt it was too crowded.

''People have told us they felt more relaxed and less crammed around the Marina."

The opening night pop sessions were an evening of pure nostalgia and modern rhythms with a mixture of foot-tapping sounds past and present.

And Sunday's version of Last Night at the Proms captured the classical imagination.

Youngsters from South Woodham Ferrers-based, Choirwood, warmed up the first night audience with a selection of lively songs, before the 60s era was heralded by Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich who belted out their hits including the whip-cracking Legend of Xanadu.

Sugar Baby Love, which sold eight million copies in the mid-70s, put the glam-rock Rubettes back in the charts and the evening concluded by swinging Leee John and Imagination with disco favourites like Body Talk.

The grand finale, as usual, was a spectacular 90s Techno Son et Lumiere, supported for the first time by Choirwood.

Sunday night's concert by the Calendar Concert Orchestra and Chorus under the baton of the highly acclaimed guest conductor, Andrew Padmore, concluding with Rule Britannia, Jerusalem and Pomp and Circumstance.

The flag-waving Last Night, which included local duo, Essence, and the Permanent Wave Barbershop quartet, attracted 5,200 spectators, about the same as last year.

This giant puppet delighted the Fantasia crowds.

Photo: MARK LEES

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.