The Inner City Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles cultivates musical expression as a vehicle for personal development, and brings to fruition the full musical and academic potential of young inner city residents of Los Angeles. We transform the lives and minds of our members through high quality music education. We teach them the great music of the world, and provide opportunities for them to perform that music in the most magnificent settings of our community. We prepare them for advanced study and high caliber success in music and otherwise. We instill in them the ancillary benefits that music instruction provides: problem-solving skills, critical thinking, self-reliance, self-confidence, self-discipline, and the crystallization and pursuit of meaningful purpose.