Westerly Performing Arts Tour Takes Young Performers Behind the Scenes at Three Downtown Arts Institutions

The Westerly Performing Arts Tour gives young singers, musicians and actors something they don’t normally get from sitting in the audience: a look behind the curtain at three of Westerly’s major performing arts organizations and a chance to find out how they can become part of them.

The guided walking tour begins beneath the marquee at The UNITED Theatre at 10 a.m. Saturday, September 19, before heading through downtown to the Granite Theatre and George Kent Performance Hall, home of The Chorus of Westerly.

Over roughly 90 minutes, participants will meet artists and educators, explore performance spaces, learn about training programs and discover opportunities to sing, act, play an instrument or otherwise become involved in Westerly’s performing arts community.

For a young person who knows they want to perform but doesn’t know where to begin, that’s really the point of the morning.

Three Stops, Three Different Ways Onto a Stage

The tour isn’t simply a walk through three interesting buildings.

Each stop represents a different part of the performing arts.

At The UNITED, the focus includes music education and the many ways musicians can develop their skills.

At the Granite Theatre, participants actually step onto the stage while learning about acting, theatrical training and performance.

At The Chorus of Westerly, the tour moves into vocal and ensemble training inside Kent Hall.

Together, the three organizations offer a surprisingly broad introduction to what’s available to a young performer within a relatively small section of downtown Westerly.

And participants will hear directly from the people who teach and create the work rather than simply picking up three brochures.

It Starts Under The UNITED Marquee

The first meeting point is one of downtown Westerly’s most recognizable landmarks: the marquee at The UNITED Theatre at 5 Canal Street.

From there, participants head behind the scenes.

The UNITED today is considerably more than a movie theater.

Its modern arts complex contains a 750-capacity flexible performance space, three cinemas, an event and gallery space and a dedicated music school.

The building hosts concerts, theater, dance, comedy, films, lectures and other programming while maintaining an increasingly substantial educational operation.

Young visitors on Saturday’s tour will get a closer look at that educational side.

The UNITED Music School Is a Working Training Center

The UNITED Music School offers instruction and performance opportunities across a range of instruments, ages and ability levels.

The idea isn’t simply to teach someone how to play scales in a practice room.

Students can develop through lessons and ensembles while being conneGcted to an active performing arts organization where musicians are regularly rehearsing, recording and appearing onstage.

The UNITED also extends its education programs beyond traditional instrumental instruction.

Its broader arts programming has included songwriting, voice, photography, video, visual arts, film and podcasting, along with after-school programming for local students.

The tour gives prospective students a chance to see where that work happens and ask the people involved what participating actually looks like.

The Building Has Been Training Entertainers for a Century, in a Way

There’s another reason the UNITED is an appropriate place to begin.

In 1926, the original United Theatre opened as a vaudeville house.

That means the building turns 100 years old in 2026.

Vaudeville theaters were variety houses. A single bill could contain singers, dancers, comedians, musicians, novelty performers and other acts.

The United later became a movie theater before closing in 1986.

Decades later, a major redevelopment joined the historic theater with the neighboring Montgomery Ward building. Following an extensive renovation, the new UNITED reopened in July 2021 as a multipurpose arts center.

A building that once presented performers now both presents them and helps train the next generation.

Saturday’s tour makes that connection unusually literal.

Then the Tour Heads Through Wilcox Park

From The UNITED, the group walks through Wilcox Park toward the Granite Theatre.

That makes the event a genuine downtown arts tour rather than three disconnected building visits.

The park itself is one of the features that makes this possible.

Westerly’s compact downtown puts theaters, music spaces, restaurants, shops and historic buildings within walking distance of one another, with Wilcox Park sitting near the center of it all.

For young participants, the walk also demonstrates something that’s easy to overlook when visiting one venue at a time:

These organizations are neighbors.

They’re part of the same arts community.

At the Granite, Young Performers Get to Step Onto the Stage

The second major stop is the Granite Theatre at 1 Granite Street.

Here, participants will step onto the stage and hear how theatrical training reaches beyond memorizing lines and learning where to stand.

The Granite specifically emphasizes the ways theater can develop confidence, communication skills and personal growth.

Those benefits matter even for children who never intend to become professional actors.

Getting onstage requires speaking clearly.

Actors have to listen to one another.

They need to collaborate, remember instructions, adapt when something unexpected happens and become comfortable communicating in front of other people.

A theatrical production is also intensely collaborative.

The person delivering the line may be the one the audience sees, but performances depend on directors, designers, technicians, stage managers and many others working together.

For a child interested in theater but uncertain about being the center of attention, there are plenty of ways into that world.

The Granite Has Been Expanding Its Youth Programs

The Granite’s mission specifically combines entertainment and education, and the theater has been developing dedicated programming for younger performers.

Its Youth Theatre Program has included theatrical training, summer camps and staged productions for young actors.

Recent youth programming has been designed for participants roughly 8 to 18 years old, giving children and teenagers the opportunity to work toward an actual performance rather than treating theater solely as a classroom exercise.

Saturday’s stop gives prospective young actors and their families a chance to see the space before deciding whether that kind of program feels right for them.

That can be much more useful than trying to make the decision from a website.

The Granite’s Stage Is Inside an 1849 Church

The building itself has already spent more than 175 years gathering people together.

The Greek Revival structure was purchased for $200 in 1843 and became the Christian Chapel in Westerly.

The building was completed in 1849 and later became the Broad Street Christian Church.

Its basic historic character survived remarkably well, although the steeple required remodeling after being damaged during the Hurricane of 1938.

The building eventually found an entirely different purpose.

In 2000, it reopened as the Granite Theatre.

The former church sanctuary became an intimate performance venue where actors now perform only a short distance from the audience.

For a young performer stepping onto its stage Saturday morning, it’s worth looking around.

That’s not a purpose-built modern auditorium.

It’s another piece of Westerly history that the arts helped preserve.

The Final Stop Is Kent Hall

The walking tour continues to 119 High Street, where another former church has become one of Westerly’s major performance spaces.

George Kent Performance Hall is home to The Chorus of Westerly.

The organization uses Kent Hall for rehearsals, classes, concerts and educational programs throughout the year.

For young singers, this portion of the tour may be particularly useful because The Chorus of Westerly has made children’s musical education part of its identity from the beginning.

Participants will learn how singers develop musicianship, vocal technique and ensemble skills, and how children can progress into serious choral performance even without arriving with years of previous training.

You Don’t Need to Arrive Already Knowing How to Sing in a Chorus

The Chorus of Westerly explicitly says that children don’t need previous voice lessons, formal music classes or other musical training to begin its children’s program.

Teaching them is part of the job.

Its children’s program is designed for young people approximately ages 8 through 18 and uses multiple levels so developing singers can be placed appropriately.

Each young singer receives at least two hours of rehearsal per week.

And this isn’t a children’s choir that exists entirely apart from the organization’s major performances.

One of The Chorus of Westerly’s founding principles was giving children and teenagers the opportunity to sing challenging music alongside adults in serious performance settings.

Young singers have long participated in the organization’s main symphonic and Pops programming.

That makes the Kent Hall stop less about asking, “Can my child already do this?”

It’s about discovering how they can learn.

The Chorus Has Built a Program That Can Last a Lifetime

The children’s program is only one piece of The Chorus of Westerly.

There is an auditioned Symphonic Chorus for adults.

There are also non-auditioned programs designed to make group singing accessible to people with different experience levels and at different stages of life.

The organization has developed a Foundations Chorus, Threshold Singers and an Encore Choir for older adults, among other educational and outreach programs.

That creates an unusual continuum.

Someone can begin singing at Kent Hall as a child and remain involved in choral music well into adulthood.

The organization isn’t simply producing concerts.

It’s trying to create singers.

Kent Hall Has Heard Some Extraordinary Music

The room the young performers will visit has hosted considerably more than local rehearsals.

The Chorus of Westerly first performed there in 1968.

Over the decades, Kent Hall has welcomed internationally known musicians and ensembles including Yo-Yo Ma, Pete Seeger, Rudolf Serkin, The King’s Singers, Chanticleer, The Tallis Scholars, the Choir of King’s College Cambridge and the Vienna Boys’ Choir.

Its history predates all of them.

Construction of the building began in 1886 as Westerly’s first Roman Catholic church, Immaculate Conception.

The Chorus eventually acquired the building and undertook years of restoration and renovation.

In 2004–05, a nearly $2 million project added an office wing and backstage access. Later work addressed the roof, bell tower, HVAC systems, rehearsal spaces and lower level.

Today it’s listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

So Saturday’s young singers will be standing in a room with some stories to tell.

The Tour Is Really About Finding Your Door In

A child saying “I like music” doesn’t necessarily know what comes next.

Do I need lessons?

Can I join a band?

What if I’ve never acted before?

Do I have to audition?

What happens at an audition?

Can I sing in a chorus if I can’t read music?

What if I want to work in theater but don’t want to act?

Those questions can make arts organizations seem more intimidating from the outside than they actually are.

The Westerly Performing Arts Tour removes some of that barrier by putting families directly in the spaces and introducing them to the people who can answer those questions.

There’s no requirement that a participant emerge from Saturday morning having chosen an artistic career.

Finding something they’d like to try is enough.

Parents Need to Come Along With Younger Participants

The tour is designed for young performers, but participants under 18 must be accompanied by an adult.

That makes sense for another reason.

Parents are usually the ones who need answers about schedules, commitments, auditions, costs and transportation before a child can join a program.

Instead of a young person coming home excited about something and trying to explain it, parent and child can hear the information together.

The UNITED asks participants to reserve a spot in advance.

The tour begins at the UNITED marquee at 10 a.m. The UNITED describes the guided experience as approximately 90 minutes, while the Chamber calendar blocks out 10 a.m. to noon, so families would be wise to keep the full two-hour window available.

Three Institutions, One Arts Community

The most interesting part of the Westerly Performing Arts Tour may not be any single stop.

It’s the fact that all three stops exist so close together.

Within one morning, a young person can explore a century-old theater reborn as a modern music and arts center, stand on the stage of an 1849 church transformed into a community theater and visit an 1880s church that became home to a nationally recognized choral organization.

They’re different institutions with different histories and specialties.

But they’re doing versions of the same thing.

They’re taking people who want to create something and giving them a place to begin.

On September 19, they’re opening those doors together.

Details

Event: The Westerly Performing Arts Tour
Date: Saturday, September 19, 2026
Start Time: 10 a.m.
Calendar Window: 10 a.m.–noon
Guided Tour Length: Approximately 90 minutes
Starting Point: The UNITED Theatre marquee/front entrance
Starting Address: 5 Canal Street, Westerly, RI 02891
Stops: The UNITED Theatre and Music School, Granite Theatre and George Kent Performance Hall/The Chorus of Westerly
Audience: Young performers and families interested in local performing arts opportunities
Under 18: Must be accompanied by an adult
Activities: Behind-the-scenes theater visit, music school introduction, Granite Theatre stage visit, choral education introduction and conversations with artists and educators
Walking: The tour travels between downtown locations, including a walk through Wilcox Park
Registration: Advance reservation is requested
Contact: The UNITED Theatre, 401-388-8208

More information is available at the Event Website link below.

To reserve your spot, click the Event Registration link below.

 

 

Featured image is an artistic representation inspired by the event and may not depict the actual people, location, or activities shown.