The Smith Center
Music
Mining Her Christmas Legacy
Deana Martin brings her holiday show, and memories of her Rat Pack dad, to The Smith Center
December 13th, 2012
For Deana Martin, Christmas hasn’t arrived until she hears her father, Dean, singing, “It’s a Marshmallow World.” “You can just hear him smiling while he sings it,” she says. Read more »
Concerts
Classical Mystery Tour
The Smith Center, Nov. 30
December 6th, 2012
As strings gently played “Let It Be,” four musicians took the stage in trademark Beatles black suits and mop tops. They could have been the real thing if your eyesight was poor—as was likely the case for the majority senior-citizen audience. The guys had clearly studied every nuance, particularly John Brosnan, who channeled George Harrison (it was a disappointment that Tony Kishman didn’t play his bass left-handed). Read more »
Concert Review
Betty Buckley
Cabaret Jazz at The Smith Center, Nov. 16
November 22nd, 2012
On the first of a four-show run, the Broadway legend tackled with aplomb the gender-bending task of performing songs traditionally written for men. The result was fun and fluid as she engaged the audience in a master class of great American songwriting. Read more »
Music
Male Delivery
Betty Buckley gives show tunes a gender makeover
November 15th, 2012
Written for men. Sung by a lady. One of the great ladies of the Great White Way. Read more »
Stage
Evergreen Vereen
Versatility never goes out of fashion when Ben Vereen is onstage
November 8th, 2012
Vereen’s résumé is full: Broadway legend (Pippin, Jesus Christ Superstar); TV star (Chicken George in Roots, Will Smith’s dad in The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Jeff Goldblum’s detective partner in Tenspeed and Brown Shoe); and song and dance man extraordinaire. Read more »
Feel Good Fete
October 25th, 2012
Strip performers get together to bring the circus to Smith Center in an effort to fight pediatric cancer. Read more »
Concerts
Dr. John with the Blind Boys of Alabama
Reynolds Hall at The Smith Center, Oct. 16
October 25th, 2012
The Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and five-time Grammy winner sauntered onstage with a hip wiggle, a feathered cane and a burgundy suit. He sang with a sexy, seen-it-all blues voice that seemed untethered by the constraints of his 71-year-old body. Read more »
Stage
The Harpist and the Horn Player
From college to showrooms to the Philharmonic, the story of a friendship steeped in music
October 18th, 2012
Either they’re escapees from what was once colloquially called the Giggle Factory or they’re Kimberly Glennie and Beth Lano. Both longtime stalkers of Las Vegas stages. One still a-pluckin’ (a harp, that is). One still a-blowin’ (a horn, that is). Both still … giggling. Read more »
Music
Doc’s Visit
This effervescent jazz icon will keep your ears young
October 11th, 2012
Entertainment legend Doc Severinsen is thanking me. The 85-year-old trumpet player, conductor and former bandleader of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson is thanking me for not mentioning his trademark colorful and complex wardrobe choices (oops!). Read more »
Showstopper
Wicked delivers on what The Smith Center promised
September 6th, 2012
Extend due respect to Wicked’s predecessors and coming successors at The Smith Center for the Performing Arts, plus its brethren on the Strip. Concede, however, that the Great White Way didn’t wind through Las Vegas—symbolically, that is—until the broccoli-tinted sorceress landed her broomstick at McCarran. Read more »
