SINGER Kate Ceberano never dreamt of being a festival director but here it is, 2013, and she’s into her second year of running The Adelaide Cabaret festival, with a program of 411 artists performing over 18 days and nights.

There’ll be some pretty big names from New York, such as Kristin Chenoweth (from “Glee”, “The West Wing”, “Wicked” and “Promises Promises”), Idina Menzel (“Wicked”), or Grammy Award winner Cassandra Wilson, transgender artist Joey Arias channelling Billie Holiday, ‘80s Hollywood star Molly Ringwald singing jazz and Adam Guettell (the grandson of Richard Rodgers).

The Aussie line-up includes Canberra Centenary creative director Robyn Archer, billed “the Doyenne of Cabaret”; Tommy Bradson paying homage to Reg Livermore; Lucy Maunder singing Irving Berlin; Paul McDermott in “The Dark Garden”; “post-post-modern diva” Meow Meow and magician and philosopher Sunny Leunig.

Last year Ceberano lifted festival box office receipts by 12 per cent, so she what’s she doing right?

“My experience in live performance makes it a shoe-in,” she tells “CityNews”, “that’s what cabaret is, it’s essentially people performing live, whether to an audience of 200 or 2000.”

But isn’t cabaret by definition something intimate?

“Not necessarily,” the famous singer-turned-director asserts, “that idea is evolving and I feel I’m a very strong part of its evolution… the actual definition is ‘performance delivered live accompanied by food and beverage,’ but to me, it’s more than that.”

Operatic baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes will join Ceberano on stage in a show called “Meet Me in the Middle”. She met him when they both played in “South Pacific” last year. Now she’s throwing him in the deep end, where “he’ll be navigating a field that is entirely foreign to him”.

She’s also throwing in other “South Pacific” cast members, not least Eddie Perfect and Lisa McCune as Shane and Simone in a revival of “Shane Warne: the Musical”.

“It’s cabaret, we all put ourselves at risk,” she says philosophically.

The 2013 Adelaide Cabaret Festival, at the Adelaide Festival Centre and city venues, June 7-22, bookings to 131 246 or online www.bass.net.au – Full program at adelaidecabaretfestival.com.au