British music festivals are traditionally all mud and wellies, not sun-cream and shorts, but for once the south-east caught the best of the weather and a sizzling summer Sunday at GuilFest 2005, at Stoke Park, Guildford on Sunday, July 17 had some great music to go with it.

My Best-of-the-Fest award winners are: The don't write us off just yet' award goes to The Zombies, who demonstrated they are still a live act to be reckoned with, pooling resources to play their collective hits, be it Time of the Season from the original band, Say You Don't Mind from Colin Blunstone's solo career or Argent's Hold Your Head Up. The closing pairing of She's Not There and God Gave Rock and Roll To You was electric and brought the sweltering crowd to their collective feet.

Acoustic act of the day was a tie; over on the UnCut magazine stage, local songwriter Alistair Cowan caught the ear with a compelling set and later in the afternoon, Martha Tilston proved that her intimate, normally solo material works equally well with a six-piece acoustic band.

Back on the BBC Radio 2 main stage, the band of the day award went to Marillion. Musically well ahead of anything else on offer, they also showed how to please a non-partisan festival crowd while keeping their staunchest followers happy at the same time. For a progressive rock band to win over the group of youngsters near me, who were solely there to see Daniel Beddingfield, was nothing short of miraculous.

Somewhat grudgingly, my crowd-pleaser' award goes to Beddingfield himself, who certainly knows how to work an audience. Towards the end of his set, he somehow turned into a cross between Bono and Robbie Williams, leaping into the dry moat between the stage and his adoring multitude, to lead the communal singing.

Surreal moment of the day was the tannoy announcement that ran: "Would Derek the dalek please make his way to the back of the stage!" (yes, a full-size dalek was trundling around the site), while the best festival moment had to be the sight of almost the whole crowd playing air guitar, led by three Slash lookalikes, to give GuilFest the simultaneous air guitar world record over 4,000, it's official.

Finally, the who's the daddy?' award must go to Status Quo. Many have tried to take their 12-bar blues crown and failed, yet after 40 years on the road nobody does it better and Status Quo rocked us into the burning sunset to the sound of Caroline, Railroad and Whatever You Want.