MULTI-MILLION selling singer Barbara Dickson returns to Wirral for a special concert next month.

The musician, actress and radio presenter will be joined by Nick Holland in a folk duet at the Floral Pavilion in New Brighton on Saturday, September 12.

Keyboard Nick joined Barbara's touring band in the mid-2000s. He also sang on her Full Circle album, the first to feature the style of music she now performs.

In 2009, Barbara was offered a festival where a 'duo' line-up seemed more effective than the big band and asked Nick to join her.

Since then, they have played together in cathedrals and abbeys, folk festivals and theatres and developed an intimate rapport with each other and the audience.

Barbara said: “It’s a different experience to working with the bigger band, but just as enjoyable and gives the music ‘breathing space’”.

Born in Dunfermline the former civil servant signed her first recording contract in 1968.

In 1974 Barbara's life as a 'travelling folk musician' was thrust in an unexpected direction when Willy Russell offered her a role in his Beatles’ musical John, Paul, George, Ringo… and Bert at Liverpool’s Everyman Theatre.

What followed was a prolific pop career recording 29 albums to date. But despite a long and glorious foray into pop, in recent years Barbara has returned to her folk roots.

She made her stage debut as Mrs Johnstone in Willy Russell’s musical ‘Blood Brothers’ in 1983.

In 1985 her duet, I Know Him So Well, recorded with Elaine Paige and taken from the musical Chess, reached Number One in the UK and went on to become a Top Ten hit around the world.

Further hits followed, but in the early 1990s Barbara moved away from pop and back to her roots in folk and acoustic music.

In the 1990s Barbara diversify more and more into acting, with major roles on TV including Taggart and Kay Mellor's Band of Gold.

In addition to her annual concert tours, Barbara has performed at numerous folk festivals around the UK as well as at the prestigious International Eisteddfod in Llangollen.

She was awarded the OBE for services to music and drama in 2001 Her autobiography, A Shirt Box Full of Songs, was published by Hachette in 2009.

More recently she has presented two series of Scotland on Song with Barbara Dickson for BBC Radio Scotland, exploring folk and roots music.

Asked if there were any ambitions left, Barbara said recently: “Oh, loads! I’d like to sing a duet with James Taylor.

“'I’d like to appear on the ‘Transatlantic Sessions’. I’d like to play again in Australia. I’d like to play in the US and Canada.

“I could go on and on! Who knows if any of them will happen? So many wonderful opportunities have come my way throughout my career, many totally unexpected.

“I always look to the future and it’s why I always roll my eyes when interviewers ask me about the highlight of my career, as if the best is behind me.

"It’s certainly not – I truly believe the best is yet to come!”

Tickets for Barbara's show at the Floral Pavilion on September 12, which starts at 8pm, are from the box office on 0151 666 0000 or floralpavilion.com