More than 100 people enjoyed an evening of homegrown talent Sunday night when Partners of Peabody Parks and Peabody Main Street changed the format for the Sleepy Creek concert series a bit.

“Instead of spending the money on a band or soloist as we have done in the past, we decided to highlight local musicians, using the band budget as prize money,” Main Street Director Shane Marler said. “We offered a $200 first prize and a $50 prize for a People’s Choice award.”

Marler said the promotion attracted a great deal of interest.

“I was fielding questions for a month,” he said. “Originally we had an even dozen entrants, but several backed out at the last minute. One young man from Valley Center had some kind of accident and broke both arms and both wrists. His guitar-playing will be sidelined for awhile.

“I was kind of surprised by the number of out-of-town entries,” he said. “Besides the Valley Center boy, there were two entries from Newton, one from Hillsboro, and three from Marion.”

The People’s Choice award went to Xavier Yabary, a 14-year-old sophomore at Peabody-Burns High School. Chance English of Peabody and Toby Tyner of Newton split the $200 first prize. Each prize was in the form of Peabody Bucks.

“We definitely plan to do this again next year,” Marler said. “Everyone had a good time and the response to the musicians’ efforts was loud and enthusiastic. The judges had a tough time picking just a couple of winners. I think they would like for us to have had more prizes.

“Peabody definitely had talent on hand Sunday night,” he said.