ARTS & CULTURE

ARTS &

CULTURE

A walker passes near the Duke Energy complex’s “Electric Avenue” mural along Wasson Way

PHOTO: PROVIDED BY WADE JOHNSTON

The Queen City Awaits Its CROWN

Cincinnati’s 34-mile urban trail loop is one step closer to completion. All it needs is $2 million — and you can help by drinking local beer.

BY KATIE GRIFFITH

The Cincinnati Riding or Walking Network (CROWN) surpassed a major milestone in June when it secured $6 million of an $8 million goal to complete segments of a 34-mile mixed-use walking/biking path.

Led by Tri-State Trails (an initiative of regional sustainability alliance Green Umbrella), Wasson Way, Ohio River Way and a public-private partnership, CROWN aims to connect over 100 miles of pre-existing and to-be-constructed trail systems while boosting economic development, improving transportation options, stimulating businesses and promoting healthy activities.

CROWN launched in August 2020 and has broken a lot of ground since. As it stands, 17 of the 34 miles are complete, five additional miles are completely funded and 12 miles await funding, says Tri-State Trails Director Wade Johnston. A number of public and private partnerships have come together to support CROWN, most notably United Dairy Farmers and Kroger Health (each contributing $1 million) and a capital campaign cabinet co-chaired by Wym and Jan Portman.

“We’ve been interested for decades in connecting people to the outdoors,” says Jan Portman. “Not only for physical, but mental health. We have dreamed about this kind of urban loop in this city. It’s such a great idea; it connects with so many priorities for so many groups of people, like transportation. But I think most importantly, the CROWN is going to connect people to places that they care about and places that can improve their lives, like universities and grocery stores and parks and the arts and healthcare centers.”

Currently mid-construction with various segments complete and open for recreation, Cincinnati’s first urban trail loop will enclose and connect more than 50 communities — that’s more than 356,000 people, according to CROWN’s website.

It’s also notable that CROWN will serve as a “hub,” Johnston says, to

access the Little Miami Scenic Trail, Ohio River Trail, Mill Creek Greenway, Wasson Way and Murray Path. It also will include downtown’s Smale Riverfront Park, which was named one of USA Today’s top 10 river walks in 2021, and Riverfront Commons in Northern Kentucky.

“The CROWN loop will take advantage of some of the great things in Cincinnati that are unique to the Midwest,” says Wym Portman. “We have a beautiful river, we are connecting to one of the best park systems in America, and we have arts and culture connections to the art museum and Cincinnati Ballet and more.”

As more segments begin to open for recreation, the benefits are revealing themselves. Jan and Wym Portman attribute the opening of a walk-up window at Busken Bakery along Wasson Way to the development of the trail, as well as a recently announced apartment project by PLK Communities LLC.

“We call that ‘bikenomics,’ where we are seeing the economics of how much people care about trails and want to be close to them and are willing to support businesses along the way,” Jan Portman says.

At about $1.5 million per mile (excluding bridges or retaining walls) Tri-State Trails’ Johnston says CROWN is a $50 million project that will leverage $42 million in federal funding in addition to the $8 million target in private donations.

CROWN now needs to secure the remaining $2 million of that $8 million and has launched promotional programs such as July’s Ales for Trails to help.

In July, a visit to MadTree Brewing Company, Fifty West Brewing Company, Streetside Brewing, Listermann Brewing Trail House, Big Ash Brewing, Dead Low Brewing or North High Brewing Company can benefit CROWN. Each brewery — all located along existing and planned parts of the path — paid CROWN a fee to participate. Ales for Trails offers a Trail Hop Card (like a passport) that can be obtained at one of the breweries or downloaded on CROWN’s website. Buy a beer, get a stamp. Get stamps from all seven breweries by July 31 to get a free Ales for Trails T-shirt and a chance to win a grand prize raffle.

Johnston sees Ales for Trails as a part of CROWN’s goal coming to life, as it benefits both patrons and trail-adjacent businesses. He also notes countless coffee shops, ice cream parlors, restaurants and retail spots that exist on the path as possible participants in similar programs in the future.

“This is what I envision will be the first of many types of programs like this that celebrate what is connected by the trail,” he says. “One of the things I’ve thought about is how along the Ohio River Trail there’s like five different local barbecue joints like Montgomery Inn Boathouse or Eli’s BBQ.”

He says it’s especially important that anyone can participate in these initiatives by walking or biking instead of driving, which positively impacts the environment as well as individual health.

“One of the coolest things about the trail network in my opinion is just seeing our city from a different perspective that you cannot see from your car,” Johnston says.

Part of the trail that’s currently walkable is the portion of Wasson Way from Marburg Avenue in Hyde Park to Montgomery Road at the edge of Xavier University’s campus. ArtWorks’ 300-foot mural “Electric Avenue” dances along a portion of the path on the Duke Energy complex beside Montgomery Road. It colorfully celebrates sustainability, energy, movement and nature and was unveiled in summer 2020.

While parts of the trail will highlight recreation, others — like the connection to the Uptown Innovation Corridor when Wasson Way is fully complete — highlight one of CROWN’s most pivotal benefits: equitable transportation options.

“The connection to Uptown is going to touch Avondale, Evanston, Walnut Hills, and it’s going to link the trail into the Uptown Innovation Corridor, and that to me is a game changer,” Johnston says. “Because all of a sudden, the trail will connect to our region’s second largest employment hub, and you have all these densely populated residential areas along Wasson Way that are now going to be connected to the hospitals and the university and all the job opportunities in that area.”

Specifically, according to Wasson Way’s website, 83,000 residents can benefit from this specific segment of CROWN plus gain walkable access to the 70 shops and restaurants in Rookwood. As of press time, three of the six phases of Wasson Way are finished, with phases four and five (1.25 miles, beginning at Marburg Avenue and ending at Old Red Bank Road) scheduled to be completed by winter and phase six (0.8 miles, beginning at Woodburn Avenue and ending at Blair Court) by 2024.

The goal is to have the trail completed by 2025.

“There are all kinds of destinations along the trail that are a part of our park system and all these different business districts that will be close by to the trail network,” says Johnston. “It’s such a cool way to celebrate the history and culture of our city.” To learn more about CROWN’s progress or to donate, visit crowncincinnati.org.

People explore Wasson Way near the I-71 overpass.

PHOTO: PROVIDED BY WADE JOHNSTON

Skateboarders glide down a Wasson Way trail.

PHOTO: PROVIDED BY WADE JOHNSTON

CLASSICAL Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra Offers Up Summermusik Concert Series ‘Under the Stars’

BY ANNE ARENSTEIN

Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra’s summer festival Summermusik returns from pandemic shutdown beginning Aug. 6, with performances running through Aug. 20 at outdoor venues throughout the city.

Nicknamed “Summermusik Under the Stars,” mainstage concerts featuring the full CCO take place at Eden Park’s Seasongood Pavilion. Coney Island’s Moonlite Pavilion hosts the afternoon chamber series, as well as one of the hugely popular Chamber Crawls — basically Classical music plus cocktails. Other Chamber Crawls take place at the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden and Pyramid Hill Sculpture Park & Museum.

Cellist Sujari Britt and violinist Caroline Goulding, both alumnae of the popular NPR and PBS series From the Top!, head a roster of soloists that includes CCO principals.

Seating is limited in each venue, masks are optional and concerts are shortened with no intermission.

As of press time, several events are nearly sold out and CCO music director Eckart Preu isn’t surprised. Speaking on Zoom from his home in Spokane, Washington, Preu radiates anticipation for the season that reflects his responses to re-emerging from semiisolation. The program lineup spotlights women as composers and performing artists as well as music’s therapeutic potential.

“We are coming out of this pandemic (as) changed people and we all need music therapy,” Preu says. “I asked myself, what is music that matters? What role can music play in healing?”

“Beethoven and Tchaikovsky were my prime suspects,” he adds. “Beethoven was the first to put himself in the center of his compositions, and Tchaikovsky especially worked through his mental turmoil through music.”

The mainstage concert on Aug. 6, “Mindful Music,” explores creative responses to mental challenges. It features Beethoven’s “Symphony No. 4,” written in the midst of devastating hearing loss, as well as Tchaikovsky’s “Variations on a Rococo Theme,” with cello phenom Britt. The concert opener is “Lyric for Strings” by George Walker, a prolific composer and the first Black musician to win the Pulitzer Prize for composition in 1996.

The theme of music as an outlet for emotional struggles continues on Aug. 8 with “Restorative Strings” at Coney Island’s Moonlite Pavilion. In addition to excerpts from chamber works by Smetana, Beethoven and Hummel, cellist Britt performs the world premiere of her composition “No One’s Driving,” and Preu will be the pianist for Nico Muhly’s “Allen & Lucien.”

Britt offered her piece to Preu, who was already planning to highlight women composers throughout the Summermusik season.

Summermusik boasts another world premiere: British composer Lilian Elkington’s “Romance, Op. 1” on Aug. 15 at Coney Island.

“She was totally unknown because she stopped composing when her daughter was born in 1926 and her husband threw out all her music after she died in 1946,” Preu says. “Her four surviving compositions were discovered by chance in a secondhand bookstore and a musicologist who arranged these scores offered me this piece.”

Preu adds that it is a “ beautiful work, extremely well-crafted.”

“After centuries of neglect, we have decades of discovery ahead of us and it’s exciting,” he says. “We need to perform this music, encourage publication and recordings so that there’s wider access.”

Women rule both as composers and performers for that Aug. 15 concert, titled “Her Voice.” In addition to Elkington, composers include University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music alumna Jennifer Jolley, Reena Esmail, Elena Kats-Chernin, Shelley Washington and Gabriela Lena Frank.

Instrumental soloists are Rebecca Andres on flute; Celeste Golden Boyer and Sujean Kim on violin; Heidi Yenni on viola d’amore; and trumpeter Ashley Hall.

Preu notes that the composers come from “very different backgrounds” and their musical languages are unique.

“Reena Esmail is Indian-American and her work incorporates Hindi music that has nothing in common with Western styles. Elena Kats-Chernin’s music is really edgy, but then she takes Bach’s music and combines it with her own language.”

Summermusik’s final mainstage concert on Aug. 20 continues to highlight women with three CCO premieres of works by Esmail, Gabriella Smith and Jessie Montgomery, whose composition “Banner” opened the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra’s 2020-21 virtual season

“I like her language,” Preu says. “She’s very subtle and very inventive. ‘Starburst’ is short, small and extremely well-crafted, perfect as an opener and it’s already been widely performed.”

The final work is Mozart’s “Turkish” fifth violin concerto with violinist Caroline Goulding, who at 29 has performed with major orchestras and garnered a Grammy nomination.

Preu welcomes the opportunity to perform outdoors, noting that there will be some amplification for sound enhancement. Even more important is the special sense of community.

“The atmosphere is more casual, and your senses reach out more to take everything in, from the music to the surroundings, which really enhances that community feeling.”

Seating options range from pods of benches and low folding chairs at Seasongood Pavilion and the Cincinnati Zoo’s Wings of Wonder Theater to distanced folding chairs at other venues. Many of the Chamber Crawl events — like the tribute to The Beatles at Coney Island on Aug. 10 — are nearly full as of press time; the CCO even added seats to some shows.

And yes, music lovers can picnic. There will be food trucks at Seasongood Pavilion; beverages including red and white wine will be available. Bring your own cooler, but no outside alcoholic beverages are permitted. Beverages will be sold at Coney Island and Pyramid Hill.

There are rain dates for events in non-covered venues. Preu says the heat is less of a concern than rain.

“Even indoors, there’s a lot of heat from onstage lighting, so we’re used to that. And the musicians constantly adjust to each other like a living organism, whether it’s intonation, an entrance or dynamics, inside or outside,” he says.

Preu — also the music director for the Long Beach Symphony in California and the Portland Symphony in Maine — is excited about returning to Cincinnati and being on the podium. He’s also looking forward to accompanying many of the chamber works on piano.

“Playing (music) with your musicians deepens our relationship and helps us get to know each other better,” he says. “It’s also an opportunity for our audiences to see another side of me.”

Above all is the delight in performing for live audiences.

“Recordings are great but the emotional magic really happens when you’re with other people,” he says. “I’m really looking forward to it.” Summermusik takes place Aug. 6-20. For more information or tickets, visit ccocincinnati.org.

Caroline Goulding

PHOTO: JAMIE JUNG Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra Music Director Eckart Preu

PHOTO: PHILIP GROSHONG

Sujari Britt

PHOTO: PROVIDED BY THE CCO