Kids & family

Best place to get your child’s groove on

Youth Philharmonic & Chamber Orchestras
323-6393

Music in the Washoe County School system squeaked its way to survival for year or two, but make no mistake. Talk of raising business taxes in Nevada disappears as fast as a plane over the Bermuda Triangle. More cuts to the school programs seem as inevitable as the grass growing greener over the septic tank. It’s a good thing that, every year, hundreds of kids get to enjoy classical music at free concerts put on by the Reno Philharmonic. And about 130 lucky fiddlers and flautists get to be part of the Reno Philharmonic’s Youth and Chamber Orchestras. The program is open to kids in middle and high schools who audition once a year to get the gig. These talented teens play five concerts a year or so, performing Mozart, Beethoven and even more contemporary stuff like Bernstein. That’s the composer—not the reporter sought out by Deep Throat for Watergate leaks.

Best place to teach a child how to syncopate

BAC Stage Kids
449 W. King St.
Carson City
883-1976

Brewery Arts Center has been the Carson City hub of the performing and visual arts scenes since 1976. It provides a comfy home to all sorts of arts organizations in the Carson area in its rehabilitated historic building that was once the Carson Brewing Company. BAC Stage Kids is Brewery’s resident children’s theater company. Since 1997, Stage Kids has provided classes and acting opportunities to more than 500 kids ages 4 through 16, and participation is usually free, free, free! This is a great way to get your children involved in the performing arts before they even hit elementary school. This year, Stage Kids is giving youth the opportunity to be part of a very fun Whose Line Is It, Anyway? improvisational production. They will also be doing Annie, Jr. and the musical melodrama Fizz. Very kid friendly!

Best place to start a child

E. L. Cord Child Care Center
Truckee Meadows Community College
674-7515

A solid foundation is necessary for those who are thinking about the possibility of bringing a new life into the world. A good preparation for the long grind of life requires thrusting the little thing into places that may be uncomfortable. The E. L. Cord Childcare Center at Truckee Meadows Community College will gently introduce your precious jewels to such exciting concepts as fingerpainting, counting and playing well with others—and what could be a better start than that?