THE music community in Darlington has pulled together to raise money after a grieving mother lost her seven-year-old daughter in a house fire.

Save Our Christmas takes place tomorrow night (FRI) at the Turks Head on Bondgate in Darlington, to raise cash for a Skerne Park family left devastated by the tragedy earlier this month.

Fire ripped through a home in Esk Road, Darlington, on Saturday, December 1, leaving the girl trapped inside. Her younger brother and a family friend escaped unhurt and firefighters rescued the girl - named locally as Lily.

But her injuries were so bad that days later she died in hospital.

The community has rallied round to collect items to help replace the family's goods but Rob Howdle, 24, decided to organise a fundraiser to pass money on to help the family.

The Darlington man said: "Most things I see on Facebook I scroll past but I saw that and thought that it was awful. My partner really related to it because she has an eight-year-old son.

"She was going through her stuff to see if there was anything she could donate. She was telling me about it and I could see how upset she was getting.

"I am quite practical and I thought, right, what can I do to help? With something like this it is not something that can be fixed. With me being a musician myself I have done quite a few charity shows so I thought it would be good to do a charity gig."

Doors open at the Turks Head at 7pm tomorrow and the event is free to enter but people are being asked to donate what they can inside.

A number of local bands of all different genres are lined up to play, from punk to metal to acoustic sets.

Mr Howdle added: "It is not about what happened, or how it happened, the issue to us is that the family has lost their house and their daughter right before Christmas and we want them to have the money to put towards whatever they want.

"The musical community in Darlington has really come together for this and I am blown away."

Bands playing include Kickback Generation, Desolation, The Wax Offs, InAcoustica, Call of the Wild, Awe-struck and Chris Davidson.