Craig Baillie, who lives in Todmorden and used to teach at Todmorden High School, is now a DJ and promotes the monthly Strictly Vinyl club night at the Venue nightclub in Todmorden town centre.

Strictly Vinyl celebrates its first birthday at the club on February 5, with the event including a guest DJ and guest vocalist.

The evening being helmed by the event's three resident DJs – Craig himself, Nick Ashworth and Scott Mellors.

Craig said he was particularly keen to put something back into Todmorden, having got into niche dance music at the legendary Out In The Sticks nights held at the club when it was the Blue Note in the 90s.

He said the Out In The Sticks nights, which have seen DJs hold a reunion event at the Venue before Christmas with more planned, attracted fans of the niche, quality music from as far afield as Preston, Leeds, Manchester and more, with guest DJs even flying in from America to play events there.

Craig said this was the inspiration for Strictly Vinyl, although one of Strictly's aims is to feature the cream of locally based DJ while keeping the musical quality high.

"We started out a year ago with one intention – to showcase local talent and provide an exciting night once a month where people can dance to the finest in new house and electro music.

"All the resident DJs are from the local area, Scott Mellors and myself are from Tod and Nick Ashworth is from Littleborough.

"We're only going to have guests on once a year, on the birthday, as by keeping it just to residents your audience knows what to expect, they get to know the tunes you're playing and you can really build a following."

For the birthday event, he said the guests would be Littleborough-based Lawrie B DJing . he has released tracks under the name Mangotrasher and Max Tweekage, and did a mixmag CD a few years ago, while local girl Karen Hawkins will give a live vocal performance and world class percussionist Jules will complete the mix.

"He'll be mobile on the dancefloor knocking out rhythms on his African tamtams amongst other things.

"I've been wanting to put all these elements together in a night for some time and now I've got my wish.

"We just want to give everyone a night they'll never forget," said Craig.

The first birthday bash takes place on Friday, February 5, at the Venue, which is in Bridge Street, Todmorden town centre, from 11pm to 4.30am, and entry is £5.