Cincinnati Sounds – center for resource discovery

The musical sounds of Cincinnati include everything from gospels to classical opera, musical theater to Appalachian ballads, visionary funk and experimental electronic music to Indian ragas—and more. As a prestigious conservatory located in a richly musical urban environment, CCM is uniquely positioned to become a national leader in documenting, researching, and engaging with the music of our city.

CCM’s Musicology Workgroup has been awarded a Strategic Collaborative Faculty Project grant by the UC Office of the Provost to research and create Cincinnati Sounds, a public-facing online platform to explore diverse repertories of the city.

The CCM Library is a research partner on the Cincinnati Sounds project. The project aims to interact with music-related resources of Cincinnati, including materials such as sound recordings, album covers, videos, sheet music, performance programs & ephemera, radio programs, newspapers, manuscripts and other archival materials—all held in a variety of Cincinnati performance and information institutions.

As the CCM Library discovers and documents such resources, they may be accessed through this center of discovery for Cincinnati sounds.

From 6-11 July 2025, the Cincinnati Sounds project team, led by Drs Kristy Swift, Jonathan Kregor, Stefan Fiol, and Jenny Doctor, ran a highly successful week-long workshop, Cincinnati Sounds: A Musical Cities' Places, Spaces and Sounds, for more than 40 residential scholars who gathered from all over the United States and beyond to immerse themselves in experiential site-based learning.
See the project website for details.

Finding resources