THE ELDERBERRIES will on December 8 become the latest band to play songs of yesteryear at Keighley Library.

The concert of 1960s classics will be a poignant return to North Street for singer Garth Cawood.

For during the 1970s Garth ran popular nightclub The Funhouse, opposite the nearby former Keighley News office, with business partner Stuart Reynolds.

The Funhouse was just one highlight of a music-industry career that saw Garth rub shoulders with the greats of the music world from the 1950s onwards.

Little wonder that this legendary showbiz entrepreneur, amongst many other veterans of the decades-past Northern music scene, grew nostalgic when they attended the recent launch of the library’s latest exhibition of local music memorabilia and pictures.

As a result Garth arranged for his own band The Elderberries – made up of members of popular 1960s Bradford bands The Dingos, Mel Clark 4 and The Dave Lee Sound – to perform upstairs.

The concert of songs from the “golden area” will begin at 1.30pm

Born in Idle, Garth became one of the earliest ballroom DJs in the UK, then in the 1950s he joined The Dingos and help them become one of the most professional and entertaining rock ‘n’ roll bands in Yorkshire.

Garth became a top compere for the many ‘package shows’ performing across the country. He became a friend of bands like The Beatles, Rolling Stones and Searchers, his parents’ home in Undercliffe becoming a stop for stars like Tom Jones and Gene Vincent.

That was when Garth and Stuart bought the Keighley Variety Club, renaming it The Funhouse and hosting the likes of PJ Proby, Diana Dors and Coronation Street stars like Liz Dawn, Lynne Perrie and Christopher Quinten.

Garth also spent five years working with his friend Jess Conrad at Brigitte Bardot’s club in the celebrity resort of St. Tropez.Time permitting on December 8, the audience can put questions to Garth and the afternoon’s compere Trevor Simpson.

Trevor, an expert on music, an avid fan of Elvis Presley and a friend of Priscilla Presley, is returning after his popular talk at the library last summer.

Admission is free to the afternoon of nostalgia, chat and rock ‘n’ roll, but there will be a collection for charity.