This man has established himself as a cabaret artist of great sensitivity and intelligence. Clint Holmes has been a Las Vegas performer for some time, but exhibits none of the negative qualities you associate with Vegas. He only has the good Vegas stuff: He is nothing if not sincere and authentic, and possesses a magnetic stage presence and a practiced but subtle showmanship that underlines what’s important in the show without overselling it.

His latest act at the Birdland Theater entitled “Holmes for the Holidays” is his jazziest yet, wonderfully complex and spontaneous. He opens with a witty turn on “Let It Snow” in which he observes, er, it hasn’t snowed recently, then launches into a swinging version of “You’d Be So Nice to Come Home To” laced with observations that his wife is back in Las Vegas, and…you get it.

His skill as an interpreter of lyrics comes across in a moody “My Foolish Heart” which he frames as a “a cautionary tale before you head into your New Year’s Eve – I hear crazy things can happen.” And he puts a tremendous sense of fun into Tom Paxton’s folk music standard “The Marvelous Toy.”

Later in the show, Holmes meditates on the imprints left by one’s childhood. His father was an African-American jazz vocalist who worked in a steel mill and his mother was a white British opera singer who taught voice. He works their story into a song he wrote himself “1944” about their meeting in WW II Europe; he has imbued the song with both richly evocative details and deep feeling, and delivers it warmly but with very tasteful restraint.

He gets more personal still, in another original “If Not Now, When,” which has become his personal motto since beating cancer some years ago. Holmes ends the show with a soaring rendition of Leonard Cohen’s ever-mysterious “Hallelujah.” Holmes is a class act, and this show is first-rate cabaret. Highly recommended.

For tickets, click here.

To learn about Jonathan Warman’s directing work, see jonathanwarman.com.