The Queen City Project offers its unique perspective of September's Midpoint Music Festival, which filled the streets of Over the Rhine and downtown with music and entertainment for all ages. Video courtesy The Queen City Project.
Queen City Cookies is an artisan cookie whose founder, Peggy Shannon, is a life-long baker and artist who put up the cookie shop as a way to offer consumers beautiful and delicious baked goods. Read the full story here.
A traffic flow design planned for Northern Kentucky aims to smooth the ride for travelers using a technique that’s new to the region. The Kentucky Enquirer reported the double crossover diamond interchange at Ky. 536 and Interstate 71/75 in Boone County will be among the first of its kind in the area. Read the full story here.
Startup Grind Cincinnati is excited to announce our first event at The Brandery on Thursday, Dec. 6, 2012. Cincinnati entrepreneurs, investors and supporters are invited to hear Tim Shigel, the Chariman and Founder of ShareThis, the largest ecosystem for sharing and engagement across the web, speak about his experiences growing a company in Cincinnati. Read the full story here.
Downtown Cincinnati boasts more residents and daily workers than the comparably sized Jacksonville core. Read the full story here.
The Cincinnati Art Museum announced Serena Urry as Chief Conservator. Urry served as Senior Conservator of Paintings at the Barnes Foundation, preparing its Impressionist and Post-Impressionist collection for the move to downtown Philadelphia. Read the full story here.
The initial concept for Lisnr came from Rodney Williams, but it came alive through a team of five co-founders on the Cincinnati StartUpBus en route to South by Southwest last March. “When I got on the bus, Lisnr didn’t have name, but within two hours, we had a presentation, and within another two hours, we had more things, and by the time we got to Austin, we had a working product,” he says. Lisnr creates interactivity with songs and albums by packaging exclusive content created by musicians with music files. For example, say that an artist announces her next album will be Lisnr-enabled. This means you can buy a music file from any source and listen to it anywhere. With the Lisnr app running in the background, you receive exclusive content via automatic notifications based on the Lisnr-enabled tracks. This content, which can be anything from a tour of the artist’s house to a peek at the song’s inspiration, comes from the artist. Backstage video, unreleased tracks, lyrics or artist interviews are other possible extras. As you listen, the Lisnr app downloads content, saving it to your device. “An average fan will unlock many pieces of content throughout the day,” explains Williams, Lisnr’s CEO. His co-founders – including Chris Ostoich, business; Chris Ridenour, tech; Nikki Pfahler, design; and Josh Glick, mobile – still form Lisnr’s team, and Williams says two new hires are on the way. Since (and during) SXSW, Lisnr garnered support from the music industry; Williams has strategic advisors from cable station MTV, publishing and management firm Primary Wave Music and the Grammy-nominated artist Nas. For these bigwigs, Lisnr represents an unprecedented connection between artists and fans. The app also tracks listener behavior, such as where, when and how often a song is listened to. According to Williams, Lisnr plans a full-scale launch in mid-2013. The company is currently supported by Cintrifuse, a non-profit startup accelerator based in Cincinnati, and the CincyTech accelerator. By Robin Donovan
Some people work four 10-hour days for perks like saving on gas and three-day weekends. Others, like Sara Cormier (pronounced “cor-me-YAY”), cram in a second job on the side. Until last April, Cormier was juggling a design gig with Cincinnati Magazine and healthy freelance traffic. When her daughter, Carmen, entered preschool, however, she decided it was time for a change. “I was kind of going crazy,” she says, noting that she doesn’t regret those hyper-scheduled days: “At least for me, I couldn’t quit my job without having built [my business] up. I wasn’t financially in a place to do that.” Cormier, who graduated from the University of Cincinnati’s College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning in 2002, launched Cormier Creative in April, and specializes in helping small businesses with branding, logos and promotions. Her services can help young companies, or those without a budget for an in-house designer, she says. “I’ve always really liked working with a business that’s just getting off the ground and starting from scratch. Once they invest in that initially, then they’re really excited about how their stuff looks,” Cormier says. She encourages businesses not to wait to start branding themselves. “You need a logo right off the bat. It doesn’t take long to get one, and I think the sooner, the better.” Because she’s worked with so many newly launched businesses, Cormier has curated a few tips for proprietors, too. Along with advising that any business that is doing business needs a logo immediately, she advises businesspeople to find a designer they trust and then relinquish control. “You’re not hiring a professional designer to recreate your sketch so much as to help you with the entire identity.” Cormier offers custom design services for all sizes of businesses as well as custom stationary – she calls herself “a paper snob” – that’s popular among local brides. Her design aesthetic favors clean lines and clever graphics. "I love all my brides, they’re really really fun," Cormier says. "We try to come up with something really custom." By Robin Donovan
Fans of Poco a Poco who were saddened by the restaurant’s recent closing may be comforted to learn that a new venture—Alfio’s Buon Cibo, which boasts veteran Cincy chefs and Italian-Argentine fusion—will soon occupy the vacated spot on Hyde Park Square. Alfio’s is the product of 18 months of collaboration between owners Scott Lambert, Alfio Gulisano and Ken Arlinghaus. The trio aims for an affordable-yet-upscale dining experience to showcase the distinct culinary style that head chef Gulisano has been fine-tuning since growing up in an Italian section of Buenos Aires. With a résumé that includes stints at Bella Luna and VIEW Cucina, Gulisano brings his multi-ethnic expertise to his namesake endeavor, which he describes as, “probably 75 percent Italian and 25 percent Argentine.” Alfio’s Buon Cibo, with a planned opening of Nov. 5, has a menu that features modern twists on classics: meat-and-cheese-stuffed empanadas, short-rib ravioli and traditional Argentine beef soup with potatoes, corn, tomatoes and onion. A carefully selected yet deliberately modest wine list rounds out Alfio’s offerings, with Argentine, Italian and North American bottles ranging from $26-42. The owners plan to introduce a variety of events and promotions in the coming weeks, including half-price wine and specialty martini nights. “There are a lot of places that are more for special occasions, like birthdays and promotions,” says Lambert. “But we want people to be able to come in here just because it’s a Tuesday or a Thursday. It’s affordable, and it’ll be a relaxed, fun atmosphere.” By Hannah Purnell Follow Hannah on Twitter.
Nathanial Chaitkin, 42, wants to spread his love for classical music with the $6,000 grant awarded to him by the Cincinnati Arts Ambassador Fellowship. At age 11, he started playing cello. He continued his studies at the Juilliard School, the University of Michigan and at University of Maryland, where he received his doctoral degree. Chaitkin worked as a freelancer for a few years after college and then played with the orchestra of the United States Marine Band in Washington D.C. for eight years. After teaching at Michigan State, he and his wife moved to Cincinnati, where he currently teaches at CCM prep and privately. With the grant money from the City, Chaitkin plans to hold concerts at Cincinnati Recreation Commission centers in underserved neighborhoods in Cincinnati. Specific locations have yet to be determined. Chaitkin says he has wanted to stage these kinds of performances for about 20 years now. When he was in college, unlike many of his music school peers, he spent time with students involved in other disciplines. It helped that he lived in a dormitory with football players and was also a history major. Most of the music students, he says, were segregated from the rest of the school, and he wanted to bridge that gap. Therein evolved his idea to show people who have not been exposed to classical music that they can enjoy it, too. He wants his new concerts to be interactive so that he can engage the audience in a discussion about music. Chaitkin plans to incorporate a piece composed by his college roommate, Evan Hause, who wrote several original songs for Chaitkin. In addition to traditional classical pieces, like Bach and Hindemith, he will play songs that most people won’t expect a celloist to play, like something by The Beastie Boys or “Impossible” by Shontelle. “I don’t think that everybody feels comfortable getting past those assumptions they have about it [classical music],” says Chaitkin. “For me, the goal is to sweep that aside and put the music in a place and a context where they feel comfortable.” The artist also hopes that the concerts will spark the appreciation of classical music and encourage people to become active members of the performing arts community. The benefits are many, including to the city’s economic status. Chaitkin’s other goal is for his project is to inspire people to create art programs in underserved neighborhoods, like MyCincinnati in Price Hill. Currently, Chaitkin is also considering creating a string quartet to accompany him at one of these concerts. Do Good: • Donate to MyCincinnati, an after school arts program for children, which shares the power of music with children in underserved schools. • Learn more about the CRC centers in Cincinnati. • Find out about art programs and events going on in Cincinnati. By Stephanie Kitchens
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