King of the keys, Prince of the piano, bard of the ballad - call him what you will, but scary-haired Tim Minchin has honed his craft and skills to the point where his songs start so earnestly, you actually think this might be a lovely serious love-song. Then he mentions malignant tumours and angry feet and you start laughing.

Anyway, he's been a busy bee writing songs for the RSC's version of Roald Dahl's "Matilda" and creating a new musical show called "Strings" - which is where this article comes in. Yes indeed, Mr Minchin will be touring the UK this winter in support of the new arrangements of the old AND a few new songs to boot and we've got all the dates right here. The "Strings" show will be a whopper and will feature Tim performing with a full orchestra, thus injecting melodrama and grandiose surrealism into the arm of the Minchin canon.

The Australian sensation will play Birmingham (8th December), Newcastle (11th), Brighton (13th), London (14th), Cardiff (16th), Manchester (17th) and Nottingham (18th). With Christmas approaching, Tim then takes a well-earned breather, returning to the tour circuit in April for two Scottish dates at the SECC's Clyde Auditorium in Glasgow on 18th April and a date at the AECC in Aberdeen the following day. Tickets cost around £35 + fees and go sale from 9am Friday 2nd July - demand will be high!

You can catch Tim talking about the tour and Matilda on this week's Friday night with Jonathan Ross on BBC1 from 10:35PM, joining him on the couch will be Robin Williams and Elle Macpherson.

If you want to catch him performing his 'classics' - "Not Perfect", "If You Really Loved Me" and "Prejudice" spring to mind - then you can catch him solo at Latitude and Sonisphere during the summer.