Music Together Rivertown: Family Music Classes in a Historic Petaluma Schoolhouse

Music Together Rivertown is the work of one teacher, and her path to Petaluma runs through more than a decade of North Bay family music. Liz, the center's director and teacher, began teaching Music Together in 2013, when her oldest son was a toddler. As her bio puts it, she "has had the privilege of creating community through music-making with dozens of families in Marin and Sonoma County." She comes to the work with a background in theater, dance, storytelling, music, Waldorf education, and arts education for children and adults, and she writes that she is "passionate about the family-centered education that happens for parents and caregivers in Music Together classes and the lasting bonds of community that are created through sharing in circles of play, movement, and song."

The program she teaches has deep roots of its own. Music Together began in 1987 as a small program in Princeton, New Jersey, created by composer Kenneth K. Guilmartin and researcher Dr. Lili M. Levinowitz, and has since grown to more than 2,000 locations in over 35 countries. It is an early childhood music and movement curriculum with decades of research behind it, in both music education and child development.

The setting could hardly be more Petaluma. Classes meet in the Studio at Mercury Theater, inside the old Cinnabar schoolhouse at 3333 Petaluma Blvd North. The iconic red building went up in 1908 as a Mission Revival two-room schoolhouse, and in the early 1970s opera singer Marvin Klebe and his family famously renovated it by hand into one of the North Bay's most beloved small theaters. Today Mercury Theater, a collective of local artists and performers, is revitalizing the historic space, and Rivertown's youngest musicians now sing where generations of Petaluma schoolchildren and performers have gathered before them.

The center's mission statement is short and warm: "To bring families in the Petaluma region closer together through the power of music," and "to spread the magic of music-making while nurturing children and their caregivers through community and play."

Kids Classes in Petaluma: 45 Minutes of Singing and Moving

Among kids classes in Petaluma, Music Together Rivertown's format is distinctive: one mixed-age class, ages birth through five, with the grownups fully in the circle. Each 10-week semester meets once a week for 45 minutes, currently on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday mornings, and every class weaves together a few core threads:

• Singing, in every direction. Each semester is built around a named song collection (the fall collection is called "Bongos"), part of a rotation of twelve collections over three years. The songs mix original tunes and traditional ones across folk, blues, jazz, and world-music styles, in varied tonalities and meters, so families build a large and varied repertoire of songs they will keep singing for years.
• Creative movement. Children and caregivers sway, hop, spin, and dance. The movement is playful on purpose: it is how young children process rhythm long before they can name it.
• Instrument play. Rhythm sticks, egg shakers, resonator bells, and gathering drums come out every week, and children are free to explore them at their own pace.
• Music that comes home with you. Tuition includes an illustrated family songbook, recordings of the semester's collection, and access to the songs and activities through the Music Together app and Family Music Zone, so the class keeps going in the kitchen, the car, and the bath.

Parents do not need any musical skill to take part. In fact, caregiver participation is the engine of the whole approach. "There is no need for music knowledge or skill; come prepared to be silly and have fun," the center's approach page promises. The program's philosophy holds that most people are wrong to think of musicality as a rare talent: its founding research concluded that all children are born musical, and that with a playful, musically rich environment, every child "can learn to sing in tune and dance accurately to a beat."

A Mixed-Age Circle Where Babies Learn from Preschoolers

Music Together made a deliberate choice decades ago to teach all ages, birth through five, in one room together, and Rivertown's classes show why. "The opportunity to observe many different models of musical expression is beneficial for both younger and older children," the center explains. "Babies are mesmerized by the toddlers' sounds and ability to move around freely, toddlers love to follow the leadership of the preschoolers, and older children love sharing their lyric ideas and dance moves." A mixed-age room, where every child is free to respond in their own way and on their own time, is also, in the center's words, "naturally inclusive for children with developmental differences."

For parents of two or three young children, the practical upside is obvious: one class, one time slot, everybody sings. For an only child, the mixed circle offers something siblings would otherwise provide, older kids to imitate and younger ones to help.

What holds it together is the teacher. One parent, Natalie G., describes Liz this way on the center's site: "Liz is one of those really special teachers whose warmth, genuine presence and musicality truly captured the hearts of my kids from the moment we began Music Together. It's a rare gift that a kids music program offers such a dynamic range of music and instruments while staying accessible and easy to love." Another family credits the classes with helping their child's speech development blossom after the isolation of the pandemic years. For a program whose oldest students are five, those are the outcomes that matter: children who sing at dinner, keep a beat on the steering wheel from the back seat, and walk into a room of familiar families feeling at home.

An Accessible, Affordable Resource for Families

Music Together Rivertown keeps the on-ramp gentle. New families can try a 45-minute demo class before committing to a semester, and the demo fee is deducted from tuition if they enroll in the current session. A full 10-week semester is $315 including all the materials, priced in line with what families see for enrichment classes in the region, and there is a 30 percent discount for each additional sibling enrolled in the same session. Babies eight months and under attend free alongside an enrolled older sibling.

The policies stay family-shaped from there. Make-up classes are unlimited on a space-available basis within the semester, so a runny nose does not mean a lost week. Any caregiver can bring a child to class, and parents, grandparents, and nannies can trade off or come together. Gift certificates are available for grandparents and relatives who want to give a semester of songs, and the refund policy is stated plainly on the center's site.

When you are ready to look at the schedule, Music Together Rivertown lists its demo classes and semester sessions on Enrichment.kids, where you can see dates and times and register in a few clicks. Fall semesters begin in mid-September, with new song collections arriving each season, year after year.

Where Song and Community Flourish

Spend 45 minutes in the circle at the old Cinnabar schoolhouse and you understand what this class is. It is a room where a baby's babble gets woven into the song, where a toddler's spinning counts as dancing, and where the grownups rediscover that they like to sing. In a century-old schoolhouse on the north edge of town, a new generation of Petaluma families is learning the oldest lesson in music: it is better made together.

Playfulness, musicality, inclusivity, connection, community. Music Together Rivertown embodies all these values for North Bay parents and kids. If you have a baby, a toddler, or a preschooler and a weekday morning to spare, browse the upcoming classes on Enrichment.kids or the center's website and try a demo class. Bring your singing voice, whatever shape it is in. That is the only requirement.