Honoring Classical Music Month with a Numismatic Note

September is Classical Music Month, and what better way to recognize the holiday than with a coin that pays homage to a place that many consider a hub for music in the Eastern United States? We aren’t talking about New York City, Philadelphia, Nashville, or even Memphis. The subject here is Cincinnati, a city noted for its diverse musical heritage. King Records is certainly a big name in the city, producing country, soul, rhythm & blues, and funk records for myriad artists. But classical music has also long had a prevalence in the Queen City.

This, thanks to a multitude of performance halls where classical orchestras (and other music assemblies) stage performances ranging from intimate and grand. Among these is Cincinnati Music Hall, which opened in 1878 and serves as the home for Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra. Cincinnati had certainly gained a reputation – at least among promoters – for its music scene by the mid-1930s. That’s when the 1936 Cincinnati Half Dollar was conceived.

Some may say the coin, carrying an obverse bust of “America’s Troubadour” Stephen Foster and the reverse inscription “CINCINNATI – A MUSIC CENTER OF AMERICA” (for what was purportedly the city’s 50th anniversary of the moniker), was struck more as a promotional piece. But that doesn’t matter as much today, when the coin remains highly popular with collectors and Cininnati has left no doubt as to the significance of its musical heritage.

The Cincinnati Half Dollar also proves relatively scarce today, as just more than 5,000 examples were struck at each of the three U.S. Mint facilities then producing coins (in Philadelphia, Denver, and San Francisco). The Cincinnati Half Dollars were sold in only sets of three (one from each mint) for $7.75 each. Examples in Mint State grades of around MS66 or better are difficult and go for big bucks.