By Michael Sion, Reno Gazette-Journal

Five years ago, a 10-year-old Grant Davis was looking for something new to try. He didn’t like sports, didn’t fit in with peers and was struggling to discover his passion. What’s more, one of his siblings was battling drug addiction and Grant, the youngest of five, felt lost in the upheaval.

Then he auditioned for a musical at his hometown Brewery Arts Center in Carson City. Though he didn’t get the role, “It was kind of one of those moments when I went, ‘This is right,’” Davis says.

An even bigger moment loomed the next year when he made the cut for BAC’s Backstage Kids, singing at a jazz festival. Davis — who’d grown up listening to his parents’ records — crooned Sinatra’s “That’s Life.”

And earned a standing ovation.

“There was something about it,” Davis remembers. “I had the audience in the palm of my hand.”

His mother, Angie, recognized it, too. “I felt this overwhelming responsibility,” she says.

She began taking him to singing, acting and dance lessons, auditions and competitions.

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