This year’s MusicNOW, coming in late March, will showcase an impressive cast of performers from a wide spectrum of contemporary music, with the expressed intent of blurring the distinctions between musical categories. The 2012 festival leans more in the direction of classical music than in the recent past, extending from modern works for church organ to improvisations for flamenco guitar and cello.

When I was in high school, we used to snigger conspiratorially at Zappa’s lyrics, which we saw as juicily irreverent and oh-so daring. At that age, we had no clue what his music was all about. I think we saw it as just a vehicle for his silliness. Turns out, the man was a certifiable genius. Who knew?! Leave it to concert:nova, Cincinnati’s genre-bending chamber music series, to explore the musical life of this much-misunderstood trailblazer.

Always a beauty, this VAE Christmas concert was that and more. Call it a musical essay, a gift of time, whatever, Nally made the listener feel immersed in the music – in another world almost. And no one does it better than the 24-voice VAE.

From “Sarcasms” to DSCH, the chamber ensemble concert:nova illuminated a painful period in history, Dec. 5, at Know Theater.

It was the Soviet era, seen through the eyes – and music – of two of Russia’s greatest composers, Sergei Prokofiev and Dmitri Shostakovich.

Review by Express contributor Mary Ellyn Hutton
The inaugural Constella Festival of Music and Fine Arts has met its own ambitious expectations. With 11 of its 13 concerts history as Express goes to press, the festival has experienced overall good attendance, especially for a new endeavor. Saxophonist Ted Nash’s concert at Blue Wisp was a sellout [...]

On Friday night, Janessa Touchet danced the title role with vibrancy and flair. An immensely gifted young dancer, she portrayed her part with both style and youthful energy, unstintingly executing all the difficult jumps and pirouettes demanded by the choreography and shining in the second act’s duet with Albrecht.

Responding to a persistent standing ovation, the quartet performed the slow movement of Brahms’ Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, a “love song,” said Pressler who, as he did all afternoon, invested lots of it in his playing.

Donald Nally, music director of the Vocal Arts Ensemble since the fall of 2009, has taken the 24-voice professional choir in a new direction – straight ahead.

The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra’s Russian Festival met the Constella Festival Friday night in Mayerson Theater at the Erich Kunzel Center for Arts and Education.

First of all, there is no quartet like the St. Lawrence. Extremely communicative, they play with an uncanny combination of informed musicality and pure emotion.