BBC Northern Soul orchestra show to go on tour

The Royal Albert Hall was the venue for the Northern Soul Prom in 2023

A show featuring orchestrated versions of Northern Soul classics is set to go on tour.

The first will be staged in Wolverhampton in April with the music performed by the BBC Concert Orchestra, and the event hosted by Stuart Maconie.

"It was an absolute triumph," said Mr Maconie of the BBC Northern Soul Prom in 2023, which led to the creation of this tour.

The five shows would be performed in the "heartlands" of Northern Soul he said, starting in Wolverhampton where there had been a "legendary" club called The Catacombs.

The shows will be hosted by writer and broadcaster Stuart Maconie

The collective sense of joy after the Northern Soul prom at the Royal Albert Hall was "amazing" and the immediate reaction among the performers was that it had to happen again, he said.

The songs from the 1960s and 70s captured the drama of being alive, Maconie said, and the live shows would be made up of 36 of them.

"It is music that it is impossible to be immune to," he added.

The five live shows will be in Wolverhampton, London, Manchester, Sheffield and Gateshead in April and May.

The opening night in Wolverhampton will be at The Halls on 24 April, with tickets on sale from 1 March.

Maconie is a BBC Radio 6 Music presenter and the Northern Soul Prom was broadcast on 6 Music in September.