When Joe Miller became the Vocal Arts Ensemble’s new Music Director, he said his vision was to help create “sonic and visceral musical experiences that transform the lives of singers and listeners.” It sounded fascinating. But what would that actually mean? We found out when Miller announced VAE’s 2025-26 season. He proved as good as his word, giving us a season with a mix of the unexpected and traditional, the challenging and the unabashedly ambitious. It is, by any measure, a season worthy of the group’s vaunted reputation. 

 The season opens on October 5 with “Table of Contents: Chapters of a New Era.” Miller has divided the program into five “chapters” — a musical table of contents. And, as Miller promised, it has an extraordinary variety of music, from Francis Poulenc to Johannes Brahms, from William Byrd to Eric Whitacre. 

 “We’ll probably never do a program like this again,” says Miller. “It’s sort of a sneak preview of the types of things people will be able to expect. Here is VAE and here is Joe Miller.” 

 For many choral music aficionados, Miller will need no such introduction. He’s been a professor of conducting and director of choral studies at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music since 2020. Indeed, more than 30 years ago, he was a member of VAE, singing under his longtime mentor, Earl Rivers. 

 “Earl changed my life,” says Miller. “I grew up in east Tennessee and had very good music education training. But I didn’t feel like I understood what it was to be a musician until I met Earl. He was a role model for how to look at music and look at life.” 

 Miller would go on to build the profile of several significant choral groups, most notably as director of choral activities at Westminster Choir College and conductor of the Philadelphia Symphonic Choir. Prior to stepping into the VAE position, he was artistic director of choral activities for the renowned Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston, S.C. 

 “Spoleto was one of the most amazing experiences,” says Miller. “I loved all the collaborating opportunities that came about from being in a vibrant multi-art setting like that. I thrive in that sort of setting. But I knew that when I took on VAE something would have to give in my life. There was no more space for anything new.” 

 The rest of the VAE season clearly demonstrates Miller’s ambitions for the group: 

Dec. 19–20, “An Italian Christmas: A Light in the Darkness,” at Christ Church Cathedral. 

“Christmas was always such a memorable thing for me when I was in the group, so I’ve curated an Italian Christmas,” says Miller. The result is a bright and festive program that, like so many of Miller’s, spans several centuries, ranging from Claudio Monteverdi and Giovanni Gabrieli to contemporary composers like Fredrik Sixten and Nathan Jones, completely unique to the Cincinnati holiday scene. 

March 20, 2026, “To the Hands: Cutting Edge Art,” in the Music Hall Ballroom. 

“This is our big, staged project — a fully immersive sensory experience,” says Miller, clearly excited about the prospect of a large-scale presentation. “The plan is to stage it in the round in the middle of the Ballroom. I love the acoustics there. It will be a great space for this combination of early and modern music.” 

Miller and VAE will collaborate with stage director Audrey Chait (Cincinnati Opera’s manager of artistic programs and new works) and lighting and video designer Sharon Huizinga (associate professor of lighting design and technology at CCM). “‘To the Hands’ is a program that combines Caroline Shaw’s Pulitzer Prize-winning work of the same name with Dietrich Buxtehude’s Membra Jesu Nostri. Shaw’s work was written as a response to ‘Ad manus,’ one of the seven cantatas that make up Buxtehude’s 17th-century masterpiece.”  

There will be a fourth program as well, slated to be part of the 2026 May Festival. 

“I would love to tell you all about it, but the announcement will soon be made in conjunction with the May Festival*,” says Miller. “What I can say is that the opportunity to collaborate with the May Festival and people like Julia Bullock (the 2026 Festival Director) is one of the reasons I was really intrigued about taking the VAE job. I love the May Festival. I’ve lived and worked all over the world and there is nothing like it anywhere.” 

It’s an auspicious first season for Miller, a season that befits the high musical standard VAE has set for itself since its founding in 1979. And it’s a season that Miller is eager to build on. 

“One of the great blessings of Cincinnati is the number of incredible spaces here,” says Miller. “I would love for us to sing in many of them. I’ll look to the core of Cincinnati to start. And then I will expand out. I heard a concert at St. Martin of Tours in Cheviot. It’s a beautiful space. I’d love to do a concert inside the Cincinnati Observatory near Ault Park, too. Of course, only 12 people could come in. Maybe that could become a film project for us. 

“The point is, so many things are possible if we commit ourselves to them.  For instance, I really want to focus on attracting 18 to 26-year-olds. I want to engage that audience. Not to program to them, specifically. But I want to invite them, and, when they get there, make sure we have a way to connect with them. I want every band, theater and choir kid to feel like VAE is a cool place to come and hear a concert. I want them to come. And then I want them to come again and again. Even more than that, I want people to look to VAE as an incubator for incredible artistic experiences.” 

That’s not a completely new idea, of course. It’s one that has guided each of Miller’s four predecessors over the course of VAE’s 46-year history. But this season demonstrates a slightly different take on that pursuit. One that is singularly Miller. One that is destined to explore music’s roots at the same time that it connects us to the new generation of composers who are changing the face of choral music. 

*Click here to be the first to know the full lineup of concerts and events of the 2026 May Festival.