MORE than £11,000 has been raised for NHS charities when music was streamed live from the living rooms of five dale musicians and a DJ on Saturday night.
A target of raising £1,000 had been set by musicians Ian Swinburn, Dave Kidd, James Brown, Luke Jordan, Andy Yeadon and DJ Craig “Tosh” Campbell who organised BC Locked Down and Loaded.
Donations flooded in during and after the gig with £8,448 being pledged by Sunday morning and the fund continuing to increase throughout the day.
As the Mercury went to press, the event had raised £11,085.
Mr Kidd said: “We can’t believe it. We are all over-whelmed with the response we received.
“It was quite an emotional evening and although it was all online you could still feel the energy of the people, strangely.
“We are all immensely proud to have been a part of it.
“The videos of the performances are still on the site and the deadline for donations is Friday [April 17].”
The idea for the event came about by chance and there are already plans to organise more with more local singers and musicians taking part.
Mr Kidd added: “It was all by chance we decided to put it together.
“Andy Yeadon started posting videos online and although it’s been a few years since I played, I thought I would give it a go and so posted a few videos as did the others, all on their own social media pages.
“Then I think it was James mentioned we should do a live gig so we started a Whatsapp group and decided to give it a go.”
Within hours of creating the social media group, more than 1,000 people signed up to attend the online event and by the time the first set was played there were 3,165 members.
He added: “All of a sudden it was notification after notification that people were joining and we had no idea it would be so popular. To be honest that’s when I started to get nervous as it’s been three years since I played live.
“But we kept in our mind it was just keeping people’s spirits up as the news is constant. People don’t want to be thinking about it all the time and need time out.”
The evening’s entertainment was rounded off with Mr Campbell on his decks, which was extended after a pledge of £1,000 to do an extra 15 minutes.
Mr Campbell said: “Because I have everything set up at home, I just started to do a few sets using Facebook. Then James approached me to do the Locked Down, which was a real honour, as those guys are the talented ones, I just play the decks.”
Plans for more events could be in the pipeline, though no date has yet been fixed.
Mr Kidd added: “There are so many talented singers and musicians in the dale we are thinking of hosting another, but opening it up with more people taking part, rather like an open mic.”
