ORCHESTRAL Manoeuvres In The Dark begin rehearsals this week for their first show with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra.

The group's Wirral-born founding members Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys will perform their greatest hits and their music and video installation, The Energy Suite, during the show at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall on Saturday, June 20.

The group will play their many hits including Enola Gay, Souvenir, Joan of Arc, Sailing On The Seven Seas and Electricity with specially written arrangements by Gary Carpenter and Ian Stephens.

Conducting the orchestra will be Clark Rundell.

Tickets for the show have sold out.

Andy, who will be rehearsing with Paul and the orchestra on Friday, told the Globe: "I’m very excited, because from what I've heard so far a great show is promised.

"It’s going to be very interesting, because our songs have been completely re-arranged so they can be played by an orchestra. It's going to be very interesting to see how they sound.

"The show sold out months ago and I’ve since spoken to the Philharmonic Hall ticket office who have said there was enough interest in tickets for a three-night run."

The former Calday Grange Grammar Schoolboy - who still lives in Wirral - continued: "Our philosophy with the show is that if you have a 75-piece orchestra, you might as well use it, which is why we’re letting them do most of the work.

"However, Paul is planning to programme some choral sounds into the keyboard and will be playing these on the night.

"I did intend, when we went back on tour two years ago, that I would try and be dignified when performing on stage in my old age.

"But the truth is I just can’t stand still when I get up there.

"I shall be moving around on stage a bit, but can’t do too much otherwise I’ll probably end up crashing into the violinist at the side of the stage.

"It’s a fantastic honour for Paul and I, two lads who couldn't even stick it out in the recorder class in school, playing with the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra."

The Energy Suite, which was staged at FACT in Liverpool in February, captured the architecture and sounds of five electricity generating power stations.

For the project, Andy teamed up with internationally renowned designer Peter Saville and Liverpool-based video artist Hambi Haralambous, who made the 26 films that were used during the group's Architecture & Morality tour two years ago.

OMD have had a long association with Peter and the show fufilled an early ambition of Andy and Peter’s to create what was originally going to be a work based on Stanlow Oil Refinery, the subject of one of the band’s songs from 1980 that used sounds recorded at the Ellesmere Port site.