About Us

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Group Orchestra Method Classes

We teach violin, viola, cello, and  upright bass simultaneously in group classes using curriculum designed to have the instruments all learn and play together.  Our programs follow the school calendar year, with special classes offered in summer. Our program is available to students from 3rd through 12th grade.

Keyboard, Choir, Pre-K and Other Music Classes

We teach these foundational music classes in group settings at the AYO Music Center. 

Youth Orchestra Ensembles
After as little as two years of group class, many students are prepared to join the Junior Orchestra, a preparatory-level string orchestra for students throughout the area. The Chamber Orchestra is our top-level ensemble, giving the most dedicated players further opportunity to develop their ensemble playing.

Concerts and Performances 

Our students perform twice a year in concerts featuring all class levels and ensembles. These concerts are free and open to the public. We also perform for the community throughout the year for various events.

Community Outreach & Partnerships

We have performed for many charity and non-profit events and fundraisers. Not only is music our gift to our community, but it provides valuable experience to our young musicians. We are proud to partner with Greater Albany Public Schools, Linn-Benton Community College, and local businesses and churches for instructional space, equipment, curriculum, and resource sharing.

 The Mid-Valley Prelude Sinfonia youth orchestra program was started in 2007 by parents who wanted to create an opportunity for youth in the Albany area to learn the violin, viola, cello, or string bass. There was no youth orchestra program in the schools, and very few private instructors.

From a single small class in 2007, we have expanded our program to five different orchestral levels and added piano, choir, and other classes. 

2021 also marked a banner year with a name change to Albany Youth Orchestra and a move to a new home, the AYO Music Center at 1405 Pacific Blvd, next to Browsers' Bookstore. We are retaining MVPS for business reasons, so you will see both names. Our new location allows us to offer classes to students from any school, offer a wider range of classes, more efficiently serve our partner schools, and be able to serve our growing student population more effectively.

 The Mid-Valley Prelude Sinfonia dba Albany Youth Orchestra is a 501(c)(3) registered non-profit organization whose goal is to provide quality, affordable opportunities for youth in the Mid-Valley area to play violin, viola, cello, or string bass in a group setting.

 Learning to play an instrument has a lasting beneficial benefit on brain development as well as on  social and emotional  development. Most musicians will agree that playing music adds many benefits to their lives.  Our hope is to bring this experience to as many local youth as possible, so that they can experience for themselves the joy, satisfaction and pride of playing an instrument.

No Financial Barriers

 We believe that great music education should be accessible to every child. We provide need-based tuition assistance and instrumental rental. 

  AYO envisions a community that makes excellent music education available to all young people in the Mid-Valley area. 

AYO is committed to:

• Excellence – Aspire to and achieve the highest possible standards artistically and organizationally.
• Discipline – Understand the work required to achieve excellence and to do what is necessary to achieve it.
• Access – Provide affordable, low cost, and free music education and community programs.

AYO is committed to being a welcoming and safe community for young musicians and their families of all cultures, races, religions, genders, sexual orientations, and circumstances. 

Fighting racial injustice connects to the very core of the Mid-Valley Prelude Sinfonia — to make music available to all children in the area. We hold equity and inclusion as the cornerstone of our organization. No student is expendable. The death of George Floyd and so many before him has elicited grief and outrage in every corner of the nation, including here in Linn County. The well-being of our community requires that we acknowledge the pain, fear, and disillusionment that exist for many of our young students of color. It is a fact that systematic racism has, and still does, produce lower incomes and large gaps in generational wealth for people of color in the United States.

Youth music education, especially the individual study of instrumental music, has been exhaustively shown in the scientific literature to increase children's learning aptitudes and provide important social and mental health benefits. These are lifelong benefits. It is also known that poverty and racial disparities work in the opposite direction. Providing such a valuable resource to all children, but most especially to those at risk, is our way of pushing aside the barriers for these kids who could see lifelong benefit from music, yet may be the least likely to encounter it.

We are committed to breaking down the barriers that prevent BIPOC children from access to youth educational opportunities. Working with our community partners, we envision a world without racism where all children can enjoy the gift of music.

MVPS Board of Directors