The unofficial local holiday known as Opening Day (referring to Cincinnati’s pro baseball team’s first game, for you non-sporto types) has had its pre-game parade for 90 years. But local folksinger Jake Speed has started what has become a new Opening Day tradition.  

There’s rarely a chance these days to witness musicians who represent both the roots and evolution of a genre. In the ’60s, for instance, you could see music history being written in Jazz clubs all over the country, featuring artists who were not just masterful players but creating and expanding an entire musical tradition.  

Just like when she was alive and performing, the love for late local singer/songwriter Katie Reider has been strongly evident since her death from a rare tumor last summer. The Web site 500kin365.org — which allows music lovers the chance to download a compilation of Katie’s music for a $1 donation — has helped keep Katie’s spirit and music alive, with 80,000 people participating.  

Kanye West's warbling, robotic voice comes courtesy of a studio trick that corrects the pitch of a vocalist (i.e. it forces the sound into key). Best known as "Auto-Tune," the brand name of the software, the corrective tactic is the overused trend of the year, audible on Pop, R&B and Hip Hop songs up and down the charts. Today's artists and producers have gone from faking it to flaunting it.  

It might have been a story of a Nick Hornby character living off the royalties of his father's hit Christmas song. But the story my father never told me until I was in my thirties is more like Tim Burton's film 'Big Fish,' wherein a son confronts the likelihood that not all of his aging father's wild tales could possibly be true, only to find out in the end that they were.  

I loved MGMT's 'Oracular Spectacular,' the mystery and vibe of it all and the amazing songs, which mixed warmer modern Dance music ideas with folksy Bowie musings and subtle Psych freakouts. I also loved the seemingly organic build of the album's success ... it's like a cult classic that millions have fallen in love with.  

Local acoustic rocker Bob Cushing is celebrating his 20th year as a professional musician with a show Sunday at the Blue Note in Price Hill. Other highlights are Foxy Shazam's Snow Show and the Dubkids and Noah Hunt hosting homecomings.  

Based on the true story of the musical Von Trapp family in 1938, the show was a hit in 1959. It focuses on the widowed Captain Von Trapp, his seven singing children and Maria, an strong-willed postulant who comes as a governess then abandons her religious calling when she and the Captain fall in love.  

Bootsy and Patti Collins; John Cranley; Elliott Ruther; Brian Powers; Shake It Records; Eric Vosmeier (Know Theater of Cincinnati); Aaron Sharpe (WNKU-FM); Andrew DeWitt (Deweys Pizza); Fairmount Girls; Lightborne; John Madden; Joan Kaup; Kathy...  

It's been a momentous four years since the postmodern New Wave blurt of The Features' major label debut EP, "The Beginning," and their first semi-full length album, "Exhibit A." The band has managed to maintain a consistent sound through personnel shifts, infusing contemporary verve into their classic Pop/Rock influences.