
The equinox is past, the weather has finally cooled a bit, and we’re in that sweet spot with both fall festivals to savor outdoors and arts events to enjoy indoors.

Linton Chamber Music and the CSO host works of Pulitzer Prize winners in an exciting week of diversity and thought. Martin Luther King Jr. takes his rightful place in Our Fair City, while Mother Nature is a contender for our attention. New perspectives on famous novels and some gypsy jazz complete your to-do list.

If you feel a little swing in your step this week, it might be all the great jazz you can hear from our fair city’s rooftops, parks and plazas. Dance, drama and divas are on tap, too, plus some history to absorb and historic skills to appreciate. Just another full week of arts and culture in Greater Cincinnati.

The easiest way to convince a skeptic that Cincinnati punches well above its cultural weight is to pull out the Queen City’s music calendar. From stage to salon, medieval to cutting edge, and up-and-comers to longtime favorites, we’ve got it covered, thanks to an array of performance organizations that makes larger cities bristle with envy.

Important social issues take center stage at the Mercantile Library and concert nova presents an intersection of music and photography in Northside. Cincinnati World Cinema helps us to understand atrocities in the West Bank, while Opera Raps shows us there is much more to “Fiddler on the Roof” than a sunrise and a sunset. Take it all in.

Apparently, it’s Film Week in Cincinnati. Cincinnati World Cinema, Woodward Theater and the OTR International Film Festival offer up some unique flicks. Movies not your thing? Cincinnati doesn’t disappoint with other CSO, Matinée Musicale and Mutual Dance Theatre events. How about a Manifest art opening? Yours Truly checks out “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” at CCM Opera.

It’s tough to lure people from a cozy living room when the thermometer needs only one digit to report on the weather outside. Our Fair City’s purveyors of art and culture want you to know, though, that they’re up to the challenge – even as many are packing up the holiday boxes. It’s an especially hot week for music, same as it ever was.