Surprise Singers Enjoy the Sights and Sounds of Cincinnati

On a recent weekend during the holidays, the Fine Arts Fund staff organized and hosted surprise caroling for visitors at the 64th annual Duke Energy train display. (You can watch the video below!)

We encouraged the singers who came from all over the region to stay in the neighborhood after the surprise and explore all the great holiday events in the central business district. Many of the carolers did so and here’s the report back from one of the participants.

We like to organize people for singing and dancing together – and love that they enjoy the sights and sounds of our wonderful neighborhoods at the same time!

"Last Saturday, as I was walking downtown, it felt …all was right with the world! The sun was shining, the air was brisk and there was hustle and bustle everywhere I looked. There were skaters on Fountain Square, carolers singing at many, many spots, the carriages and trolleys were all decked out for Christmas, parents were bringing their children by the droves to see the trains and all the sights and sounds of the season. THANK YOU, THANK YOU to all who have worked over the years to reinvigorate our downtown and make it a wondrous place for families to come and make Christmas memories. Those impressions of downtown at Christmas will be with me forever."

Carol O'Toole, Anderson

Getting Ready to Move the Fine Arts Fund

We're moving -- after 35 years in this location! We're excited about our new space in the vibrant Over the Rhine neighborhood with theaters, art schools, new housing, restaurants, galleries, etc. But things are looking pretty messy in these last days before our move. Take a walk in the old office with us!

Thanks for voting! We have your results.

Here are the top five songs you like to sing for the holidays - in an artsy chart:

We hope you all get out there and sing with a group soon!
We are planning on it!

Vote for Holiday Singing Favorite

We love it when people come together to sing and dance. At this time of year, there are lots of opportunities to connect with friends, family, neighbors, and even strangers (!) for holiday singing.

We got to talking...which songs make the list of holiday favorites for singing?

We were struggling to remember all the words ourselves and found that when we sing together it's easier! There's something about singing with a group, y'know?

Photo credit: http://bit.ly/7B9ITj

What We Wore to Art - Taft Museum New York Drawings

We went to the Taft to meet the new Director, Deborah Emont Scott, and see the new display of (amazing and wonderful!) drawings for the New York Historical Society.

The museum is all dressed up and pretty for the holidays. Here’s what we wore.

Lisa and Tom Sharing the Joy

We like to share a good time. So, sometimes we just have to dance -- in public.

Check it out. (Double click to go to YouTube and see some special animation in the video.)

Lisa and Tom, Communications Associates at the Fine Arts Fund,

dancing to the tunes at Newport on the Levee

Be a City Planner

This is a shout out to everyone planning to stick around our region for a while!

The City of Cincinnati is working on a comprehensive plan for the future – and asking that you share your thoughts now! Hey - it's not as boring as it sounds -- "Plan Cincinnati" even has a YouTube channel.

Here’s how our city officials describe the effort – the first in over three decades:

A Comprehensive Plan is best described as a guide to the City’s future. The Comprehensive Plan will inform current and future decision makers where we are now, where we want to go, how we intend to get there, and who will help us along the way.

More specifically:

• It will define the City’s biggest assets and challenges
• It will make recommendations about the type and character of development appropriate in different parts of the City
• It will recommend and prioritize policies, key projects, and resources and determines implementation partners
• It will provide guidance to the City in developing and directing future capital budgets
• It will serve as the basis for zoning recommendations throughout the City

Earlier this year, the planners hosted some community meetings about the plan and now they are promoting a survey for more input.

Go right now and complete it here.

If you are reading this blog – you probably have ideas about the power of theatre, museums, music, festivals, galleries, dancing, etc. to benefit people. We know that the large and small arts events all across our community have surprising ripple effects of benefits for everyone in the region. The arts bring us together to share ideas and make our neighborhoods vibrant, busy, and fun.

When you take the survey, you’ll notice that there are couple of places to weigh in about the importance of planning for a strong arts & culture life in our region. If you want our city leaders to take action and include arts in our comprehensive plan for the future - you need to tell them now!

What We Wore to Art - Linton Music

On a Sunday afternoon, in threatening weather, we went to hear some music in one of our city's most wonderful settings. At the church on Linton Street, the musicians and the audience can talk. And when the musicians come out to play, they share something of themselves and the experience of getting ready for the concert, and often something about the music - when it was written, the circumstances, when it was last played, and such. Occasionally, a player gets something wrong and this audience is quick to correct - right during the performance. It's not exactly clapping between movements, but you do feel like something special happens between the people who come to share the sound and the players too.


Here's what we wore to Linton Music - you'll notice it was raining by the time we left.

What We Wore to Art - @CincyPlay's Three Sisters

We went to see the new play at Cincinnati's theatre in the park last week. Sarah Ruhl wrote a NEW version of Chekov's Three Sisters -- and it's goosebump worthy and conversation generating.

We stayed after the show and talked about the parallels between this play and the show currently at Know Theatre (Boom) which also has a ghostly quality if a completely different mood. And both are certainly about "love and dreams".

Here's what we wore:

Why are they practicing the Splash Dance?

We've shared their favorite art form - now can you guess why these Fine Arts Fund staffers are practicing the Splash Dance? Did you think that was all over?

From left to right: Ashley Guethlein, Ann DuCharme, Lisa Maly, Shannon Gilmore, Kristen Alvarez, Tom McLaughlin

Exclusive Photos! Dress Rehearsal for Splash Dance

The night before our surprise flash mob dance on Fountain Square, people from across the region came together for a dress rehearsal in the ballroom at Music Hall. (Thanks to our friends at Music Hall!)

Everyone had practiced in small teams -- with volunteer dance "captains" -- over the previous three weeks. The first time we all danced together, lots of us were a little teary. It was really something to see nearly 200 people create this amazing experience together.

The next night, we danced as a surprise for Cincinnati on Fountain Square at the opening of the MidPoint Music Fest -- in the rain as it turned out. You can see that here. (In the video - listen for the voice at the end saying, "Let's do it again!")

Our amazing photographer:

Scott Beseler

The local bands:
The Chocolate Horse The Kry Kids Freekbass and Tobotius The Hiders The Sweep

Neighborhood Alive with Streetscapes

We went to the 7th Streetscapes festival at the Clifton community art center. The great old school building was filled with families, artists, kids making art, people buying art to support the center....and outside the ArtWorks team was painting cars.

Ummm -- I maybe offered my car for next year.

Everyone came to see the cars transformed over two days - and famous paintings recreated in chalk in the old schoolrooms - and kids making art upstairs and on the walks outside.

What We Wore to Art - Dancing Swans

People from all over the region are coming together this weekend at the Aronoff Center and cheering for the many swans in Cincinnati Ballet's Swan Lake. The sets, the colors, the jumps....it's great to be part of that show. And...wow - that's visually arresting!

Here's what we were wearing.



Cincinnati was full of people all around tonite!

Surprise Splash Dance Video

Cincinnati, which embraces the arts like no place we know, erupted in a mass flash dance celebration on Thursday evening.

It had been raining, but stopped just long enough for the first ever splash dance surprise. Dancers amazed the onlookers at the music festival kickoff event when they suddenly started to dance after the first band finished.

Hundreds of people from all parts of the metro area and all walks of life volunteered their time and resources to plan the surprise over the past eight weeks.

It started with just a few people from theater, dance, music, museums, and the Fine Arts Fund staff, and grew to include hundreds of Cincinnati residents.

Even though the initial invitation didn’t say what the participants would be doing, hundreds of people signed on to show their enthusiasm for the arts. We successfully kept the secret for weeks because we all shared the goal of touching others in our community with the unexpectedness of the event.

It is amazing how the arts reach everybody in every part of our city. We started with a small group, and before you knew it, we were dancing with people who live from Mason to Covington, and all over the region. The volunteer dancers included everyone from soap executives to young children.

Great big thanks to Scott and Riann and everyone at Lightborne, which produced the video, and contributed in so many ways to making this a fun event that lives on in this video so many others can share with friends and family!

The Creative Team -- volunteers from large and small arts organizations across the region who helped the Fine Arts Fund organize the dance -- spent one afternoon listening to local musicians and choosing the music together. More thanks go to these local bands for contributing the music:

The Chocolate Horse
The Kry Kids
Freekbass and Tobotius
The Hiders
The Sweep

The First Ever Splash Mob Dance

Photo: Scott Beseler for The Fine Arts Fund