MUSIC has returned to Keighley's Cliffe Castle after more than 100 years' absence.

There will be with a programme of free performances throughout the winter, spring and summer at the museum.

The Bradford Council-run facility will host free concerts featuring musicians and groups from Keighley and the surrounding area.

The concerts, which will take place on Sundays at 2pm, will be in the museum's Bracewell Smith Gallery to echo the building's musical history.

The Butterfield family, who lived at Cliffe Castle in the Victorian era, were music lovers and regularly held performances in the manor house and grounds.

They even composed their own pieces, which may be performed at some of the concerts.

Some of the performances will be themed around other events or exhibits in the museum.

The season is due to begin with Haworth Ukelele Group on January 31, playing well-known songs, old and new.

Haworth Band will play traditional brass band music on February 28 then Skipton Community Orchestra will play on March 13.

May 8 will see a group of young musicians from the Small World Music Project based in central Keighley.

The Happy Memories Singing Group, from Bradford Alzheimer's Society, will perform on June 12, followed by award-winning Bingley female choir Opus 44 on July 10.

Other groups are due to be confirmed for February 14, March 27 and April 10.

Building work has been taking place at Cliffe Castle Museum over the past couple of months in the Breakfast Room and Great Drawing Room.

This was to prepare for the installation of a 19th century malachite chimneypiece in the Drawing Room and the movement of a white marble chimneypiece to the Breakfast Room.

Cliffe Castle was originally the home of Victorian millionaire and textile manufacturer, Henry Isaac Butterfield.

Completed in the 1880s, the building was funded by the Butterfield family’s industrial empire which included wool textile mills and a shipping business that took British goods to Europe, America and China.

The completed house was a showpiece of international art and French decoration and was the scene of many glittering social events.

Butterfield family connections included the Roosevelt’s of America and members of the court of Napoleon III.

In the 1950s the building was bought by Sir Bracewell Smith, a local man who became Lord Mayor of London.

He used architect Sir Albert Richardson to turn Cliffe Castle’s gardens into a grand public park and remodelled the castle to be a free museum for the people of the district.