By Karen Davis
Guest Columnist

One of my fondest memories of childhood was when my mother took me to the children’s music series of the Fort Worth Symphony. It helped foster my lifelong love of music through productions such as Sergei Prokofiev’s “Peter and the Wolf.”

In San Antonio, the Children’s Fine Arts Series plays a similar role, with seven regular shows and several special events during the school year that make learning about music, and other subjects, fun for kids ages 3-10. They offer musicals, individual performers and puppet shows.

This is the group’s 25th season, Executive Director Kathleen Cuny Miller said.

“This started out as a project of the Judson Montessori School, where I was a parent volunteer,” she said. “The school did it for five years, and I was in charge of it. Then the school was getting bigger with more things going on, so they told me if I wanted to keep the arts series going on my own, I had their blessing.

“I had many people working with me, and we made it an independent nonprofit. In the beginning, the performances were only on Sunday afternoons, and we had three shows the whole season. Then we started adding shows and having them on weekdays so the schools could come.

“Now, a big part of our mission is providing shows for children from the Title I (disadvantaged) schools and inner-city schools, special education students and those from organizations involved with children and families, such as the Healy-Murphy Center, the Ella Austin Center, Boysville and others. Students from those programs get in free.”

More than 130,000 have attended the performances for free since the series began presenting shows in the schools in 1989, she said.

The program receives funding from the Texas Commission on the Arts, the city of San Antonio’s Office of Cultural Affairs and “a lot of private foundations,” Miller said. Individual contributions also are welcome, she said.

Shows are presented at the Charline McCombs Empire Theater at 226 N. St. Mary’s St. downtown and the Laurie Auditorium at 715 Stadium Drive on the Trinity University campus.

“The kids love the shows,” Miller said. “A lot of them would never get to go to these theaters if it weren’t for the series. We choose from a variety of professional arts groups from this country and abroad who are touring with shows totally designed for children.”

In deference to children’s shorter attention spans, the shows generally don’t last more than an hour, she noted. Most of the shows are based on books the children read in school, she said, and study guides are available on the group’s Web site: www.ChildrensFineArtsSeries.org.

“With the groups that come in from other countries, there are a lot of different components the children can learn about – language arts, geography, history, math and different cultures,” Miller said. “We’ve had groups come in from Canada, Korea, Austria, Netherlands and the United Kingdom.

“It’s a joy to do this. It’s so much fun when you see all these children coming to the performances and having a good time.”

For adults and for students who don’t qualify for free entry, tickets are $4 for the daytime performances and $9 for the evening performances. Tickets are $11 for the special-event performances. All tickets can be purchased on the CFAS Web site or by calling the office at (210) 340-4060.

The three remaining performances for this season are:

April 18: “Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!” presented by the Big Wooden Horse Theatre Co. of the United Kingdom. Charline McCombs Empire Theatre, 9:45 and 11:45 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. It features original music and audience participation.

May 6: “Joe Scruggs in Concert,” 10 a.m. only, Laurie Auditorium. He’ll be doing his Nanny Nanny Boo Boo Musical Revue.

June 10: “Beauty and the Beast,” presented by Paul Mesner Puppets, 9:45 and 11:45 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. at the Charline McCombs Empire Theatre. The puppets bring out some unusual aspects of this familiar story.

Karen Davis, a veteran San Antonio journalist, will write an occasional arts column for this paper. To send her comments or suggestions for coverage, e-mail her at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .