A Michael Jackson tribute performer who started out miming to his idol's records at his local youth club has announced his first arena tour.

Ben Bowman is now one of Britain's top Jackson tribute acts having played halls and theatres across the UK and abroad.

Until now, the pinnacle of his career had been performing at the prestigious London Palladium. But now he has taken his craft one stage further with a string of arena dates.

Ben, who grew up on the Isle of Sheppey, went to Canterbury College and now lives in Deal, is booked to play arenas in Leeds, Derby, Liverpool, Sheffield, Birmingham and Glasgow with his live band and dancers.

He said: "It's a dream come true. I can't believe it. It will be the closest I will ever get to experience the performances Michael did himself. It's mind-blowing."

"I never thought I'd be in this position. I always thought I was lucky to be doing theatres and even luckier to have done the Palladium. I thought that was the pinnacle of my career so this has come as a huge surprise."

He added: "As much as I love performing in theatres, I feel the arena format fits the show even better."

He is planning to add more songs to his set to make the arena shows longer.

Ben's first public appearances were miming to Jacko records at Sheerness County Youth Club. Then he began singing live at Priory Hill Holiday Park, Leysdown, where he worked as a bottle boy in the evenings and practised singing during his day job on the check-outs at Minster Co-op. His first professional gig was at the Wyvern Hall, Sittingbourne, in 2005.

He admitted: "It's insane. The first arena date is on November 4 just after my birthday. I will be stepping on stage for my first arena show at the age of 36."

He added: "The arena experience may be a lot like Michael may have done at the O2 before he died."

Jackson died on June 25, 2009, aged 50, at his home in Los Angeles, California, after suffering a cardiac arrest caused by a fatal combination of drugs given to him by his personal doctor. The self-styled King of Pop had been due to perform a series of summer concerts in London and had been rehearsing rigorously.

See a trailer for Ben's show here.

Ben said: "Everybody is really excited about the arena shows. The creative juices are flowing with the lighting guys and sound designers. We have a partner company which will be bringing in the sound system and we will throw all the lights we own into this. It will be a pretty big production."

Tickets went on sale last week and 2,300 have already been snapped up. The Michael Starring Ben dates have been put together by Ben's manager James Baker Productions in association with Cuffe & Taylor and Live Nation UK.

For years, Ben was pumping his body full of powerful drugs every night unknown to his audiences to mask the excruciating pain of a crumbling hip.

If that was not enough, the singer's world was rocked when a stomach ulcer burst while he was on stage at Margate's Winter Gardens at the start of his 2014 tour, sending him to hospital and forcing him to postpone a string of dates. "I thought I was going to die," he admitted.

Former Sheppey School pupil Ben was a star-struck eight-year-old when he first saw Michael Jackson perform at Wembley Stadium as part of the Dangerous Tour in 1993.

The new shows will be at Glasgow SEC Armadillo arena on Friday, November 11; Sheffield City Hall on Sunday, December 4; Birmingham Utilita Arena on Friday, March 3, 2023; Derby Arena on Friday, April 21; Leeds First Direct Arena on Saturday, April 22, and Liverpool's M&S Arena on Sunday, April 30.