The Castlegate Festival 2026 programme has been announced, including workshops and radio from Sheffield Live!

The tenth edition of the Castlegate Festival celebrates local organisations and institutions within the Castlegate area of Sheffield between September 12th and 20th 2026. 

The festival is a celebration of heritage as well as the rich arts, music and market scene, featuring food, music and workshops from a variety of community organisations including Sheffield Live!

On the 19th and 20th of September, Sheffield Live! Is bringing a dedicated radio station, Castlegate Festival Radio to the festival from our new home, 42 Waingate. Attendees of the festival can come along to see the building and contribute their stories as the radio broadcasts across the weekend plus listen to live music and chat from our team on DAB and online. 

Also in 42 Waingate, the old Tap and Barrel pub, Sheffield Live! Will be hosting a “Future Memories” exhibition, highlighting the history of the building whilst sharing personal stories and memories of those in the community. During this event, creative workshops will be held on the past, present and future of the Castlegate area and the former pub itself. 

More information about Castlegate Festival can be found at https://www.welcometosheffield.co.uk/visit/whats-on/castlegate-festival/

Keep an eye out on Castlegate Festival Radio for more updates about our festival schedule. 

Sheffield Live! presenter, Ben Keegan, proposed to his partner, Tracey Rogers, during his live radio show, Deserted Ireland Discs.

As Tracey discussed the final track of the show, Summer Wine by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazelwood, reminiscing about a recent road trip on the way back from France, Ben asked her one more question before the song started playing. He got down on one knee and asked “Tracey, would you do me the honour of marrying me?” whilst presenting an engagement ring.

Initially, Tracey responded with laughter and asked if he “was tying his shoelaces again”. When speaking to the couple after this event, Tracey told us that Ben had previously got down on one knee on a trip to Venice, and then proceeded to tie his shoelaces.

When Tracey realised Ben was genuinely proposing to her, she went silent for around four seconds, which she told us was “a long time to be quiet for me”. Her answer to the big question was “Yes. There was no question that I would not say yes.”

Reflecting on the lead up to the proposal, Ben said “We’ve been together for twelve years in September and I love her very much… Once I decided to ask her, I thought, how should I ask her?”

“I realised I had the perfect platform with my radio show. I’ve been asking Tracey to come on this show for a while now, so I knew she wouldn’t suspect a thing.”

On Deserted Ireland Disks, a guest is invited each week to discuss their life and play songs related to specific moments and memories. Ben used this platform to create a new core memory for himself and Tracey on Sheffield Live!

A disused Sheffield city centre pub is set to be re-opened as a live arts and community media centre following acquisition for Sheffield Live!, the city’s community radio and television operation. The former Tap and Barrel, on Castlegate, will be renovated to accommodate radio, TV and podcasting studios, a public cafe and bar, and performance space for artists and promoters.

Sheffield Community Media, which hosts Sheffield Live! radio and TV, has purchased the former public house with the support of social investment lender, The Key Fund. It plans to raise further investment from a community shares issue to refurbish the bar and performance spaces. The building is situated at the corner of the former site of Sheffield’s mediaeval castle, built on the Sheaf Field from which the city takes its name. The neighbourhood is undergoing major renovation including plans for a new urban park to open next year.

Steve Buckley of Sheffield Community Media said: “Acquisition of the former Tap and Barrel meets our long held ambition to find a space for live performance, community arts and social enterprise that can integrate with our broadcast media facilities. We are inviting people to get involved and we welcome expressions of interest in use of the space and contributing to the project.”

Sangita Basudev, co-founder of Sheffield Live! said: “We are excited to be moving to this iconic location, on the site of Sheffield’s former castle and opposite Lady’s Bridge, the first bridge across the River Don. With Castlegate now part of the city centre conservation area we look forward to developing our role in promoting local heritage and connecting communities.”

Tchiyiwe Chihana, director of African Voices Platform, a partner in the project, said: “We are delighted to have the opportunity to build on our work with Sheffield Live! and to contribute to a new space for community arts that will showcase our city’s diverse talent and enterprise.

Castlegate has a growing cluster of cultural activities from grassroots projects, like RiteTrax and Delicious Clam on Exchange Street, to major new arts facilities on Commercial Street, including the planned S1 Artspace visual arts gallery and Harmony Works centre for music education.

Sheffield Community Media has benefitted from support with concept design from the University of Sheffield School of Architecture and has been assisted by Co-ops UK in developing the investment model. It looks to build on these and other partnerships with plans for a year round programme of cultural events and activities.

As a community benefit society, Sheffield Community Media is preparing to launch a community investment offer inviting people who care about Sheffield’s culture, heritage and social enterprise to take an ownership stake in this ambitious new creative hub contributing to the regeneration of Sheffield’s historic core.

Sheffield Community Media is inviting interested parties to get in touch by writing to: info@sheffieldlive.org

Friday 19th September 2025
6pm – 3am
£6 on the door after 9pm

Join us for a night at Hagglers Corner to celebrate 25 years of Sheffield Live!’s community broadcasting to the city and beyond!

Featuring DJs from long-running shows on the station – past and present. DJs on the night include Deepgroove, Dubcentral, Junglist Alliance, Latino Times, Mid Afternoon Memories, Platinum Plates, Sounds Like This, Spinning Jazz, The Night Train, Two Foot Left and The Breakdown.

Come along at 6pm for a special broadcast in the intimate Grub Records focusing on the importance to you of a single record. Bring a record and a story, memory or association to talk about!

The media landscape has changed dramatically since Sheffield Live! started off in 2000 as a weekend broadcast for Sharrow Festival. It quickly moved to regular events-based broadcasting, internet radio when live-streaming was in its infancy, and podcasting, before podcasting was a thing. It gained a full-time FM community radio licence in 2007, one of the first of its kind in the UK, and joined others in forming Sheffield Live! TV in 2014. It’s now also available on DAB with broadcast coverage extending across South Yorkshire. Broadcasting continuously to Sheffield and beyond for 25 years is some achievement. Many a successful DJ and broadcaster has cut their teeth on the station and it has given voice to a multitude of artists, activists and academics.

But really the story of the station is in its original intentions: to be a place where presenters of all ages, backgrounds and abilities can share a variety of distinctive music and speech based programmes to reflect and serve the diverse communities of Sheffield. It has been sustained by the passions and enthusiasm of its volunteers, including the founders and directors of the station and the many who have passed through its doors, whether that is presenting a show, reporting and news gathering, organising, fixing, painting and decorating.

With a challenging environment for the funding of community media and the increased dominance of global media conglomerates and digital technology giants, an independent and community media space is more important than ever to reflect the often untold stories, unheard voices and unconventional music to which Sheffield Live! has given a platform.

Join us for a party at another Sheffield independent mainstay, Hagglers Corner, on 19th September to mark 25 years of Sheffield Live!

Produced by Cultural Appropriate Resources

Produced by Sheffield Home of Football

From the Sheffield Live archives June 2023

From the Sheffield Live! archives 2024

From the Sheffield Live archives (2024)