Engelbert Humperdinck, BIC, Thursday 22 November

WHEN Tom Jones decides to record an album of crooning classics with a bevy of hip young music stars, it's one of the hits of the year and everyone hails him the new King of Cool.

But would anyone take Engelbert Humperdinck seriously if he attempted the same thing? Somehow, I don't think so. (He did actually released a dance version of his greatest hits a year or two back, but sadly it never made it past the razor-wire of critical acceptance.)

Unhappily for Humperdinck and his fans - and there are thousands of them out there, swooning away to the heartbreaking romantic strains of Release Me - the Sixties star who named himself after the classical composer of Hansel and Gretel has always, with outrageous unfairness, been thought of as a poor man's Tom Jones.

Just what he has done to deserve such a reputation is a mystery, although giving yourself one of the campest names in showbiz history probably doesn't help.

Humperdinck - real name Arnold Dorsey - grew up in Leicester as one of 10 children and discovered his flair for singing in a pub talent contest by impersonating Jerry Lewis.

After a false start at Gerry Dorsey, he changed his name and leapt into the music charts with the number one smash Release Me, the classic of romantic yearning which famously managed to keep The Beatles' Penny Lane off the top spot.

Humperdinck's subsequent string of hits - mostly melancholy-tinged love songs - included There Goes My Everything, The Last Waltz and Les Bicyclettes de Belsize.

Despite losing his foothold on chart success sometime around the start of the Seventies, Humperdinck still commands a loyal following.

And, cool or not, it was Humperdinck, not Tom Jones, who gave Elvis the idea of wearing leather jumpsuits and enormous sideburns....

The show starts at 8pm. For tickets and information, call the box office on 01202 456456.