Founded in 1923, the Winnipeg Youth Orchestras (WYO) is the oldest Youth Orchestra organization in Canada. The aim of our organization is to provide young and aspiring musicians from across Manitoba with the opportunity to play music in an orchestral setting. 

Originally formed of a single orchestra group, the Winnipeg Youth Orchestras organization has grown over the years to meet the needs of the local community. We now consist of three orchestra groups: the Youth Strings (Junior), the Youth Concert Orchestra (Intermediate) and the Youth Symphony Orchestra (Senior). The program is open to students between the ages of 7 and 21, and we currently have 135 students enrolled in the program. Entry into the Winnipeg Youth Orchestras is by audition only, with the auditions held annually in April and September for both new and existing members.

We offer a stimulating and enriching musical program for our students during the course of our season which runs from September until May. Each orchestra rehearses once a week as a group and has numerous highlights throughout the season, including but not limited to:

• Camp weekend intensive for Youth Strings and Youth Concert Orchestra
• Fall Fantasia concert held in the end of November where all three orchestras perform
• Adjudicated Scholarship Competition in December with junior, intermediate, and senior competition categories
• Wintertide concert held in February where our 2nd and 3rd place Senior Scholarship Competition winners solo with the Youth Symphony Orchestra
• Spring tours to schools across Winnipeg and surrounding areas
• Sectional opportunities where musicians meet with their section and get instruction from Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra musicians to build their skills with their orchestral pieces
• Sounds of Spring Concert held in May where all three orchestras perform and our 1st place Senior Scholarship Competition winner plays a full concerto with the Youth Symphony Orchestra

We also offer support for musicians who require financial assistance in order to allow for even more youth to play in the orchestral setting. Currently we:

• Partner with Sistema Winnipeg where we welcome Sistema musicians to play in our orchestras at no cost.
• Offer over 10 bursaries each year to musicians from families who need financial assistance.

In order to create an enriching experience at the WYO, our musicians play with many different partners and many different styles of music: 

• Fall 2024 – Youth Symphony Orchestra performed Symphony no. 4 by Tchaikovsky with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra and WYO alumni for the WYO 100th birthday
• Winter 2024 – Youth Symphony Orchestra performed Vivaldi’s Gloria with choir leader Vic Pankratz and the Westgate Mennonite Collegiate Concert Choir
• Fall 2023 – Youth Symphony Orchestra performed Pyotr’s Dream composed by Andrew Balfour, an Indigenous composer from Winnipeg who is also a WYO alumni
• Spring 2023 – Youth Symphony Orchestra performed Adoration by Florence Price, Black Female American composer
• Spring 2022 – Youth Concert Orchestra performed A-flat by Black Violin, a Black American classical turned hip hop strings group. Music by Wilner Baptiste, Kevin Marcus Sylvester, Marc Antonio Rodriguez Dias Jr., arr. Larry Moore
• Spring 2022 – Youth Strings and Sistema Winnipeg Orchestras shared the stage through a concert called Sistema & WYO Jamboree, in which both ensembles performed for each other and audiences of participating families. The concert ended with a joint performance of Farmyard Adventure by Toronto-based composer, Shreya Jha. The piece was commissioned by the Sistema Canada Network in 2021 for use with Canadian Sistema programs, and this special collaboration event with Sistema Winnipeg was the world premiere of the work.
• Spring 2021 – Youth Strings, Youth Concert Orchestra, and Sistema Winnipeg students recorded a virtual performance of Summer Walker Dances by composer Stephanie Ann Boyd, an American composer, who joined the Zoom rehearsal and led a discussion with the musicians

Within Winnipeg, we have strong ties to the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, the Virtuosi Concert Series (University of Winnipeg) and the University of Manitoba Orchestra. In addition, an increasing number of our players participate in the annual Winnipeg Music Festival. All these connections enable us to offer our students the best possible musical experience during their time in the program.