I shouldn’t have been astonished when I saw thousands of people Friday night streaming to events in the Washington Park area of Over-the-Rhine. However, this wasn’t about Flying Pig, the great Cincinnati marathon that was happening that weekend, or FC Cincinnati. All those people were going to see Damon Gupton conduct the music of Star Wars with the Cincinnati Pops at Music Hall, as well as to theaters, Memorial Hall, events at the School for Creative and Performing Arts, to Washington Park and to an art opening in a tiny gem of a gallery a few steps from Music Hall.

I was heading to Wash Park Art for the opening of a remarkable installation, Anna VanMatre’s “Primary Fundamentals.” This is the U.S. premiere of the exhibition, which had its world premiere in Guiyang, China, a joint commission of the SKYSEA Museum of Art and the Xiyun Academy Gallery in 2025.

In this series, Anna explores the fundamentals that sustain our life on Earth — water, sun and fire — in stunning, nature-inspired creations that are almost hyper-realistic. (Read about her process in this article I wrote about another exhibition she had at the Auschwitz death camp in her native Poland a few years ago.) Anna’s husband, Rick VanMatre, saxophonist and professor emeritus of Jazz Studies at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, created new music to accompany the exhibition’s opening.

Coming up: Anna will be giving an Artist Talk, 6 p.m. May 21 at the gallery, 1215 Elm Street. It runs through June 13. info: washparkart.com.

And on Sunday (May 3), I attended the final program of the Linton Chamber Series in Avondale’s First Unitarian Church. Besides the sun streaming in through its Tiffany windows, I’m partial to piano trios, and there were two of them: Beethoven’s Trio in D Major, “Ghost,” and Mendelssohn’s Trio No. 2 in C Minor, with pianist Benjamin Hochman, CSO concertmaster Stefani Matsuo and CSO principal cellist Ilya Finkelshteyn.

Haydn’s Flute Trio in G Major opened the program, featuring the CSO’s retiring principal flute Randolph Bowman, with Finkelshteyn and Hochman.

Each trio was distinctive and inspiring in its own way. The Haydn made a delightful opener, and I especially enjoyed the fleet, light articulation of each player. What is there to say about Beethoven? It was utterly profound, absorbing and played with breathtaking artistry. And what a treat it was to hear Mendelssohn’s “other” piano trio, written after the more familiar D Minor, and the last chamber piece he wrote. It is difficult for the pianist, and yet it was so brilliantly performed by Hochman, who balanced “fairy” lightness with moments of massive sonority at the Steinway. I could see Matsuo and Finkelshteyn smiling through these movements. For an encore, they played the unforgettable second movement of Mendelssohn’s D Minor Piano Trio.

Hochman told us he was last here 20 years ago, to appear with the CSO and the Linton. I hope he returns.

This program repeats tonight at Congregation Beth Adam in Loveland. Linton also announced next year’s season under its artistic directors Jaime Laredo and Sharon Robinson. More information here: lintonmusic.org.

Just a week earlier, more than 4,500 people attended the CSO’s two sold-out performances of “The Firebird” with giant puppets. Here’s my review, free to read, with thanks to the Cincinnati Business Courier.