The Natchez Festival of Music has been present the opera, “Little Red Riding Hood” for students in grades kindergarten through sixth as its educational outreach program twice a day during the week of April 18-21 in surrounding towns and this week to schools in the Natchez area as the 2011 opera for children.

The educational outreach program, through the opera presented, reaches out to all communities of children.

Public and private school students share performances together. Many of the children from all strata of society experience a medium of music that they have never experienced. Twenty concerts will be performed with more than 6,000 children in attendance.

The children’s opera, “Little Red Riding Hood,”  written by Seymour Barab, deals with the importance of following the instructions of parents and teachers not to talk to strangers.

Little Red Riding Hood is sent by her mother to take some treats to her grandmother. Her mother tells her to go straight to grandmother’s house without wasting time or talking to strangers. Little Red Riding Hood completely ignores her mother’s instructions.

Instead she begins a conversation with the Wolf, who intends to harm Little Red.  See how Little Red is saved and what she learns about not obeying her mother and talking to strangers.

Schools with students kindergarten through sixth grade that have participated at Braden include the following: Adams County Christian School, the Natchez Public Schools — West Primary, Frazier, McLaurin and Morgantown, Trinity Episcopal Day School and Wilkinson County Christian Academy.

Other area schools heard the opera in their own settings.

These included Brookhaven Academy, Brookhaven Elementary School, and the Mississippi School of Arts in Brookhaven, Chamberlain-Hunt Academy in Port Gibson, Franklin County Upper Elementary in Bude, Jefferson County Lower and Upper Elementary Schools in Fayette, and Vidalia Lower Elementary and Vidalia Upper Elementary in Vidalia.

Parents with children ages kindergarten through sixth grades who do not have a class attending the opera are welcome to come with their children to a free performance of Little Red Riding Hood at 9:30 a.m. or 12:30 p.m. today at Braden School, the headquarters building for the Natchez-Adams School District at 10 Homochitto St.

Bobbye Wynn is a retired music teacher and serves as chairman of the education program for the Natchez Music Festival.