Happy PRIDE!

Please do all you can this month to let your personal rainbow light shine bright - if not for yourself, than for those around you. And, remember to lean on others if yours gets a little dim.

Find a Pride Festival or Parade near you, attend, and buy from local vendors!

Remember to thank businesses who *still* support the LGBTQ+ Community!

-Alynn, Alea, and Chuck - your PRISM team

Join PRISM for a Pride Week kickoff mixer on Monday, June 23!

Whether you're on your way to OutReel and Cindependent's screening of Portrait of a Lady on Fire and short film Sister Wives at the Woodward, or you just need a post-work cocktail, swing by Tillie's on June 23rd beginning at 6pm and say hi as we kick off Pride Week in Cincinnati! The first 20 guests will receive a drink ticket for one beverage on us.

Hope to see you there!

Coming Soon!

Blended Café & Club is a lesbian-owned café by day and nightclub by night, built to be a safe, vibrant space for queer women and the LGBTQ+ community. Their Kickstarter campaign launches Tuesday, June 3—sign up to be notified and support this all-or-nothing mission:

 https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1882452014/blended-a-cafe-by-day-queer-club-by-night 

(Kickstarter campaigns are pledges you can make towards a certain goal, with money only being taken if the full goal is reached.)

Cincinnati Pride

Cincinnati Pride is one of few local Prides that is still free, despite being as large as it is. With recent DEIA initiatives by many corporations being cut, the Cincinnati Pride Board made the decision to release certain sponsorships. Many believe we cannot put on the same event without those corporate dollars, but we know this community better than that. Please join us - show your support of our beloved festival (Cincinnati CityBeat's #1 festival 3 years running!) by volunteering and/or donating. No one person puts on Pride - this is a collaboration of thousands!

Find out more information about our parade and festival on June 28th here.

Sneak peek!

While our 2025-2026 Listings booklet will be released first at Cincinnati Pride, get a sneak peek at our advertisers right here! The booklet's hard copy edition is made possible by these businesses and nonprofits - please consider visiting their websites and learning more about them!

• Aquatic and Garden Decor
• Caracole
• eXp Realty - Bobby Sells Cincy
• Frost Brown Todd - Ryan Goellner
• Health Therapy - Whayne Herriford
• Huff Realty - Wes Van Winkle
• NPower
• New School Montessori
• Ohio Lesbian Archives
• Parkside Primary Care
• Playhouse in the Park
• Reliant Search Group
• St. John's United Church of Christ
• Tillie's

Recovery Friendly Hamilton County

Recovery Friendly Hamilton County is working to connect with workplaces in need of recovery-friendly services. The epidemiological team at Hamilton County Public Health has found some alarming trends concerning local overdose deaths among the workers of key industries: construction/extraction, food/serving, and installation, maintenance, and repair:

https://hamiltoncountyhealth.org/monthly-fatal-overdose-report/

We provide all our designees with free resources in the following areas:

• Linkage to care
• Training
• Recruiting
• Promotion
• Wraparound services
• HARM reduction supplies
• Consultation
• Policy and procedure resources
• Cost-saving connections

Visit our website to learn more about this free way to support your employees who are in recovery and to become an RFHC-designated workplace today.

Local Art

The Classical Pride Tour

June 4 @ 5:30pm

Music Hall - outside

Tickets

In celebration of Pride Month, join us for an Outdoor Tour of Music Hall led by the Friends of Music Hall tour guides followed by a private social hour at The Symphony Hotel’s Rooftop Bar. Ticket price includes a 60-minute guided tour, one specialty cocktail or beverage and snacks.  

Join the Friends of Music Hall's (FMH) knowledgeable guides for a 60-minute outdoor tour of this National Historic Landmark. Explore Music Hall's history, the symbolism and design of the architecture, the challenges at every step of construction, and the people who made it happen, along with information on the culture and society of the neighborhood in 1878. Historians, preservationists, architecture enthusiasts, and adventurers alike will gain new insight into why Cincinnati Music Hall truly merits its designation as one of the best and most beautiful concert halls in the world. 

Homing Instinct: Letting Go of the Shore

Dani McClain, author, and Lydia Dean Pilcher, filmmaker

through June 8

Weston Art Gallery

A multi-screen cinematic installation by Lydia Dean Pilcher (Brooklyn, NY) based on the story by Dani McClain (Cincinnati, OH) from the anthology, Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements.

In the near future, two friends contemplate a federal mandate requiring residents of coastal areas to relocate within 30 days due to an extreme rise in sea level. McClain’s story asks Where do we go when the fantasy of the infinite is no more? As a filmmaker, Pilcher was intrigued by this and other questions posed in the story, including how to define and choose home during times of crisis and destabilization. In this dramatic narrative, characters played by Barrett Doss (Station 19, Grey’s Anatomy) and Kineta Kunutu (The Blacklist, Citidel) explore the roles of government, authority, and the individual as they face climate catastrophe and reimagine their futures.

Pilcher and McClain assert that fossil-fuel dependence and resource depletion demand not only economic and political solutions but also narrative solutions. “Letting go of the shore” is a reference to a metaphorical river discussed between the friends, a way to imagine overcoming fear and trusting the unknown. Homing Instinct: Letting Go of the Shore uses the language of dance to traverse a world of realism, dreams, and the metaphysical.

Rigoletto

June 12 and 14* @ 7:30pm

*June 14 is the Opera's Pride Night - a post-concert reception will follow the performance in Wilks Studio

Music Hall's Springer Auditorium

Tickets

Rigoletto is a court jester with sharp wit and a merciless tongue. By cruelly mocking a grieving father, he sets in motion a tragic lesson in poetic justice. Featuring iconic arias like “Caro nome” and “La donna è mobile,” Verdi’s masterpiece sees Rigoletto become intimately familiar with the dangers of careless love, misguided vengeance, and the inescapable lesson that, under no circumstances, can you fool fate.

Sex n' the City: A (Super Unauthorized) Musical Parody

June 14 @ 7:30pm

Aronoff Center's Jarson-Kaplan Theater

Tickets

Sex n’ the City: A (Super Unauthorized) Musical Parody follows your favorite single gals looking for love in the big city. They tackle serious questions like "will I ever find the one?," "can you ever really be over your ex?," and "for the third time, it’s a neck massager!" Come join Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte, and Samantha on a hilarious trip through New York in the '90s.

Soul and Sound: Dueling Pianos and Artistic Tributes to Harlem Renaissance

June 17 @ 8pm

Music Hall's Wilks Studio

Tickets

Experience a virtuosic evening spanning multiple genres and time periods. Inspired by the artistry of the Harlem Renaissance, pianists Kevin Day and Kevin Miller present opera, jazz, and classical repertoire along with poet and curator Tifara Brown and special musical guests. 

(Note: Cabaret tables will be seated with 4 persons per table)

Gallery Talk: Erica NJ Allen

June 24 @ 7pm

Weston Art Gallery

Free and open to all

Gallery Talks at the Weston Art Gallery are an open forum for connecting artists to the community. They foster an atmosphere of inclusivity and intellectual exchange. Meet the artists of the 2024-25 Season at the Weston and learn about the passion, materials, and inspiration behind every show.

Born in Guatemala, and currently residing in Cincinnati, OH where she teaches at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, Erika NJ Allen creates immersive mixed-media installations exploring her personal journey and the broader immigrant experience. This is Not a Banana Republic (June 20 - August 24) unfolds as a symbolic battleground depicted through clay sculptures, and evocative photography. Here, the resilience of the human body stands as a defiant gesture against oppressive systems. The banana, once a simple fruit, emerges as a potent metaphor for the artist's struggle and the enduring war against the immigrant experience.

Tosca

June 26 and 28 @ 7:30pm

Music Hall's Springer Auditorium

Tickets

Floria Tosca suspects her lover of being unfaithful when really, he’s helping an escaped political prisoner and friend. This misunderstanding mutates into a series of escalating and irreversible misfortunes once Baron Scarpia, the chief of the secret police, enters the scene. Set in Rome during a time of national upheaval, as Napoleon’s army marches on Italy, Puccini’s epic opera stands as one of the most enduring and beloved of all time. Whatever darkness or desires Scarpia may bring, there is nothing Tosca will not do for art and love.

The Listings

The 2025 - 2026 Listings will be published this month! Copies will be available first at Cincinnati Pride. If you don't find us there, but would like a handful to share, please email number of copies and address to thecincinnatilistings@gmail.com.

Community Support

GLSEN

Up Over

Funky, art-lined watering hole with cheap drinks, a Mardi Gras vibe, and tables outside. Outside food permitted.

Open daily until 2:30am

M - F open at 4pm

Sa - Su open at noon

624 Main Street - Covington

Up Over on Facebook