In Brief: Art and music

Holiday music

IRISH TENORS WELCOME
HOLIDAY SEASON IN SONG

Now that Thanksgiving's over, it's beginning to sound a lot like Christmas.

At least at The Smith Center, where the Irish Tenors - Ronan Tynan, Finbar Wright and Anthony Kearns - visit Monday night, combining holiday green with the green of their homeland in their Premiere Irish Holiday Celebration Tour.

Since the Irish Tenors began touring together in 1998, the trio has become one of Ireland's most popular musical exports - second only to U2.

And their holiday celebration concerts have served up a beguiling blend of Irish and seasonal favorites, designed to warm hearts, lift spirits - and inspire serious celebratory foot-tapping.

The concert begins at 7:30 p.m. Monday in Reynolds Hall at The Smith Center for the Performing Arts, 361 Symphony Park Ave.

For tickets ($26-$99), call 749-2000 or visit www.thesmithcenter.com.

Music

'FRANK & FRIENDS' BRINGS
BROADWAY, POP TO TOWN

It may be Vegas, but it's not Frank Sinatra.

No, "Frank & Friends" - which checks into The Smith Center's Cabaret Jazz Wednesday for two performances - refers to Grammy- and Tony-nominated composer Frank Wildhorn.

And Wildhorn's friends? Fellow Grammy nominee Jane Monheit - made her Cabaret Jazz debut in May - and the club's resident headliner, Las Vegas' own Clint Holmes.

Accompanied by an all-star jazz trio, they'll perform Wildhorn's pop and jazz hits (including Whitney Houston's "Where Do Broken Hearts Go?"), plus selections from such Broadway shows as "Jekyll & Hyde," "The Scarlet Pimpernel," "The Civil War" and this season's "Bonnie and Clyde." Wildhorn also will share his own adventures on Broadway and abroad.

"Frank & Friends" begins at 7 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday in Cabaret Jazz at The Smith Center for the Performing Arts, 361 Symphony Park Ave. Tickets ($40-$95) are available by phone at 749-2000 or online at www.thesmithcenter.com.

Art

STUDENT ARTISTS SHINE
IN HENDERSON EXHIBIT

It certainly beats a showcase on the refrigerator door.

Young artists from Del Webb Middle School in Henderson have a more formal display area: the Gallery at the Garden, inside Henderson's Hilton Garden Inn.

The hotel's second student exhibit features 25 artworks, from pastels and charcoals to watercolors and collages. (The inaugural Garden in the Gallery show focused on works by students at Sue Morrow Elementary School.)

Work by the Del Webb students will be on display through February at the Hilton Garden Inn, 1340 W. Warm Springs Road, Henderson.

Gallery hours are from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily; admission is free.

For more information, call the Henderson Cultural Arts and Tourism Department at 267-2171 or go online to www.HendersonLive.com.

Chamber music

AWARD-WINNING TRIO
PERFORMS UNLV RECITAL

Acclaimed chamber music ensemble Trio Cavatina - pianist Ieva Jokubaviciute , cellist Priscilla Lee and violinist Harumi Rhodes - will perform Thursday at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

The UNLV connection extends beyond the recital setting, however. Among the works they're scheduled to play: a trio composed by Virko Baley, UNLV's Distinguished Composer-in-Residence, who's been on the university's faculty since 1970.

Baley's in good company. Rounding out Thursday's Trio Cavatina program are Gabriel Faure's Trio in D minor, Opus 12; Maurice Ravel's Trio in A minor; and Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu's 1993 "Between Tides."

Trio Cavatina's members first met in 2005 at Vermont's Marlboro Music Festival; four years later, they won the Naumberg Chamber Music Competition. Trio Cavatina made its Carnegie Hall debut in 2010 and has also performed at Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and Wolf Trap outside Washington, D.C.

A San Francisco Examiner review praised the trio's "equality of voices," commenting that "one might say this was an ensemble that put the 'chamber' back in chamber music."

Trio Cavatina will perform at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at the Doc Rando Recital Hall in the Beam Music Center at UNLV, 4505 S. Maryland Parkway. Tickets are $25 (with discounts for UNLV students, faculty and staff) and may be purchased by phone at 895-2787 or online at pac.unlv.edu.

- By CAROL CLING