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The Las Vegas Academy wind ensemble and choir will once again take the stage at Reynolds Hall this week.
Monday, Oct. 10, 2022 | 2 a.m.
The Smith Center for the Performing Arts has gradually returned to full programming over the last year in recovery from pandemic-era closure, but this week another important annual concert is back at Reynolds Hall at its regularly scheduled time.
The Las Vegas Academy of the Arts, the downtown magnet high school for local students focused on success in the performing and visual arts, will send its band, choir and orchestra to perform at 7 p.m. Wednesday. “Standing Together: Unity in Song” will also feature local legend Clint Holmes and Grammy Award-winning saxophone player Timothy McAllister performing alongside more than 230 students, with tickets available at thesmithcenter.com.
Clint Holmes
Technically, the concert took 2020 and 2021 off due to the pandemic, although the annual fall performance from last year was held in February of this year, a happy return for the school’s student-artists and staff. This year marks a decade of such concerts at the Smith Center as the academy has taken the stage at Reynolds Hall since it opened.
“We bring in different guest artists each year, and this year we have Clint Holmes, a singer, producer, songwriter and amazing musician who has been part of the LVA family for a long time,” said Brian Downey, the school’s development director and former longtime band and orchestra teacher. “He’ll work with the students and perform, and there’s also sax soloist Tim McAllister, a professor at the University of Michigan and one of the most well-known classical saxophone teachers and performers around. We’re so used to associating [the sax] with jazz or popular music, so it’s a real treat to hear it in the classical genre.”
The academy’s wind ensemble, symphonic chorus and philharmonic orchestra will perform selections from “West Side Story” as well as a world premiere performance of faculty member and alumni Jorge Machain’s “Tales of Old and New,” among other music.
“The Smith Center is a world-class space for our students to get the opportunity to experience what it’s like to be onstage in a professional setting. It’s really part of a formative experience where they get to see that next level may be aspiring to,” Downey said.
While every school in Southern Nevada dealt with its own challenges during the pandemic, LVA was hurting because “our school is built on students interacting and creating art together,” Downey said, noting that online learning and collaboration platforms were helpful but are not built to replicate in-person artistic experiences.
The school’s musical groups have a busy calendar that’s just getting started this fall, including some events that are wrapped into the academy’s 30th anniversary. For more information, visit lasvegasacademy.net.
