SOONER, rather than later, Jools Holland will be playing with hisRhythm and Blues Orchestra at York Barbican.

The host of BBC2's late-night music carousel, Later...With Jools Holland, will be joined in York tomorrow night at 7.30pm by special guest Marc Almond, the ever-dramatic singer from Leeds electronic pop duo Soft Cell and Marc And The Mambas, who was the 2013 recipient of the Ivor Novello Inspiration Award.

There too will be Jools's regular singers Ruby Turner, Louise Marshall and his fellow former Squeeze member, drummer Gilson Lavis, performing big band numbers spanning his entire solo career, as well as showcasing this month's new album, Sirens Of Song.

Released on November 24 on East West, its14 tracks comprise collaborations and duets between Jools and a host of iconic female voices in contemporary and classic music, among them Kylie Minogue, Emeli Sandé, Joss Stone, Laura Mvula, Amy Winehouse, Rumer, Mabel Ray, Imelda May, Eartha Kitt, Melanie C and KT Tunstall.

Ruby Turner contributes Jumpin’ In The Morning and I Still Went Wrong, while Louise Marshall sings A Vow. Should you be wondering, Amy Winehouse's Monkey Man is taken from Jools's Hootenanny in 2006; Eartha Kitt's Ain’t Misbehavin’ comes from the April 25 2008 edition of Later… with Jools Holland; and Kylie's Should I Stay Or Should I Go is "the perfect blend of a music cocktail", according to Jools. "Take the essence of Professor Longhair’s New Orleans piano style, select a Jones and Strummer Clash punk classic, invite a poptastic global superstar to the Holland studio…Result," he says.

Summing up Sirens Of Song, Jools talks of the privilege and honour of celebrating and bringing together, for the first time ever, "some of the greatest female vocalists and writers of our time on this new record". “I’m so grateful to have had the support of these incredibly gifted women in music who bring that magical female perspective to every track," he says. "Collaborating and working with this diverse and dazzling array of talent, who hail from all sorts of genres spanning from today and back to the jazz age, has been an inspiration and something rather special. Enjoy.”

Meanwhile, Jools's tour guest, Marc Almond, has announced a British tour for April 2015 to promote next year's new album, The Velvet Trail, set for release on March 2. Almond, who released an EP this year featuring collaborations with Pulp's Jarvis Cocker and The Libertines' Carl Barat, will perform old and new material at Leeds Town Hall, one of 12 dates, on April 24.

Tickets go on sale at 10am tomorrow online at gigst.rs/MAlmd, gigsandtours.com and ticketmaster.co.uk or on 0844 811 0051 and 0844 826 2826. Jools Holland tickets are still available on 0844 854 2757 or at yorkbarbican.co.uk