THIS year's Autumn in Malvern Festival was one of the most successful since it started in 1989, said artistic director Peter Smith.

Several events, the Sir Roy Strong talk, the Sassoon lecture by John Stuart Roberts and the Britten Sinfonia concert, were sell-outs.

The Britten Sinfonia concert was notable for the age range of the audience, which included many young people, said Mr Smith.

"There were young people there from the age of 14 upwards, which I found quite striking," he said.

The concert was also distinguished by the performance of Roxanna Panufnik's specially-commissioned Powers and Dominions, which was preceded by an informal discussion of the work between the composer and conductor Nicholas Cleobury.

"Following this, the audience found themselves fully engaged in the music," said Mr Smith.

The theme this year was Japan with music by Japanese composers and work of Japanese artists.

Mr Smith said he had heard from traders who said the event had drawn people into Malvern and boosted their businesses.

He thanked shops in Great Malvern which had introduced Japanese-themed window displays. One of them, Easytravel in Worcester Road, had also been complimented from an unlikely source.

He said: "An actual Japanese person had gone in and congratulated them on the quality of the calligraphy on display which has been drawn by one of the girls who worked there."