WANNABE pop stars from across Blackburn and Darwen battled it out at a music extravaganza for school pupils.

Students belted out tunes to a panel of judges as part of the "Pop Idol" style Enterprising Music Championship at King George's Hall tonight.

Nineteen live acts, including solo artists, duos, groups and instrumentalists took to the stage and braved the cutting feedback from the judges in order to have the chance of being crowned the Enterprise Rocks Champion.

Pupils - and even a pair of teachers - from Beardwood High School, Darwen Vale High School, Our Lady and St John Catholic Arts College, Pleckgate High School, St Bedes RC High School, St Wilfrid's Church of England High School and Witton Park High School all took part in the event.

The winning act was 12-year-old St Bede's pupil Miranda Myles, from Pleasington.

Wearing a black tiered dress, she wowed the 100-strong audience with her version of Leone Lewis' Better in Time.

Speaking after she collected her trophy, she said: "It has been a brilliant night and I am glad I have had so many people here to support me. I have been singing since I was eight and do a lot of karaoke.

"I take singing lessons now and would like to go into the music business but I don't think I would go on X-factor - it doesn't seem a very fair."

Terri Birtwhistle, from Darwen Vale, scooped second place and Alice Casey, from Our Lady and St Johns, came third.

A special performance by 12-year-old former Witton Park pupil Ilvana Kacka playing Elvito on her Flamenco guitar was shown on screens. Ilvana had only been in the country for two months when she was deported back to Croatia - but organisers thought she had such talent they showed a film of her performing.

The contest, organised by enterprise challenge day provider E4A and sponsored by Blackburn with Darwen Council, is now in its second year.

As part of the event the acts have already been professionally recorded for a compilation CD and teams of eight pupils from each participating school have been competing to develop the best marketing plan and CD artwork for the recording.

St Wilfrid's School won the pitch and will now see their design work grace the front of the CD.

E4A director, Mike Ellacott said: "This is a very exciting event which combines a music championship with enterprise education and also helps to raise funds for charities and the schools through sales of the compilation CD. It's a great way to engage students in enterprise education."

Louise Hunt, chairman of the Enterprise Pathfinder committee and a teacher at Blackburn's Witton Park High School, said: "Our students really enjoy performing and contributing to charities through sales of the CD - it's a real chance for hidden talents to come to the fore. The event also gives our students the chance to develop enterprise skills by working together in teams to create an effective marketing plan to sell as many CDs as possible and to design the CD artwork.

"All this has to be achieved against very tight time constraints but our students really enjoy the experience and have fun too."