Melbourne Cabaret Festival Opens Next Week

Next week, the second annual Melbourne Cabaret Festival will be showcasing a stellar line up of Australian and international cabaret artists in South Melbourne’s Arts and Cultural Precinct.

From Tuesday 19 July until Sunday 24 July, Melbourne audiences will have the rare and unique opportunity to see over 100 performers in 36 cabaret shows, showcasing a selection of acts from comedy cabaret, musical theatre stars, New York styled acts, vaudeville, ‘dark and edgy’ cabaret and queer shows.

Also featured this year is the Melbourne Cabaret Festival’s Professional Development Program – a series of specialty masterclasses and workshops by industry professionals. Avigail Herman (former head of Music Theatre at NIDA) and Tim Smith (founding co-ordinator of VCA’s Music Theatre course) will both lead workshops on the 23 and 24 July respectively.

David Read, curator and co-ordinator of the Festival for the second year is thrilled to be showcasing some hand picked cabaret performances from across the Australian and international stage. He says his impetus for starting the Melbourne Cabaret Festival in 2010 came from his experiences as a cabaret venue owner.

“I used to own a venue in South Melbourne called ‘The Butterfly Club'”, said Read “and I saw so many shows presented at the venue which only had an audience of 50 due to the seating capacity of the venue.”

“Most of the Melbourne cabaret scene happens in small venues, and quite often both the venue and the performer often don’t have the financial capacity to really promote the shows”, he said

“By having a festival compacted in the one week, not only does it give performers an opportunity for people to see their shows it gives their shows a longer life. It also enables so many more audience members to come along and see some top quality acts!”

Appearing at this year’s Festival are seasoned performers Avigail Herman, Queenie Van De Zandt, Alexis Fishman and many more. When asked what were his top picks for this year’s festival, Read responded:

“I always answer this question by saying ‘it’s not really about me’! The way that I have programmed the Festival is quite diverse. You’d be hard pressed to find a festival this diverse, I think.

• If you’re an opera fan: You’re going to like someone like Jon Jackson – he’s an opera performer
• If you love the queer performing arts scene, there are acts like Dolly Diamond and Luke Gallagher
• If you like your indie scene, there is Emma Dean and the Jane Austen Argument

So it doesn’t come down to my choice – it comes down to whatever particular style of performance you like and appreciate”

From next Tuesday, a new cabaret show will begin every 15 minutes from 6.15pm till late. Among the cabaret performances will be 11 world premieres and five Melbourne premieres.

The festival is taking place in various venues in South Melbourne:
Get along to the Melbourne Cabaret Festival this year, soak up the atmosphere in South Melbourne’s Arts Precinct.

In a few years this event will be bigger than Ben Hur – wouldn’t you like to know you were there from the beginning?

Melbourne Cabaret Festival – July 19 – 24www.melbournecabaret.com