Introduction to Youth Music Centre

The Youth Music Centre was established in Bigwood House, Hampstead Garden Suburb in 1967 and since that time has become one of the foremost Saturday morning music schools in London.

The essential aim of YMC is to welcome all children from the age of two to eighteen years into our community and to help them achieve their highest musical potential within a creative and happy environment, where they can come together to enjoy making music.

YMC provides classes in musicianship skills for the very youngest children before they embark on instrumental lessons at the age of five or six. After a year of group lessons on the violin, viola, cello, double bass or recorder children are ready to have their first orchestral experience. We also provide theory classes up to grade 8 and voice/aural classes. We are proud to say that we have many children who stay with us for their entire music education.

50th Anniversary celebrations in 2017

Watch the concert here

Reflections on a wonderful milestone

At the 50th anniversary concert of the Youth Music Centre on 18^th June it was clear to see that we continue to go from strength to strength both musically and as a community of people who want to share our love of music with each other and with our children. It was a tribute to our founders that our ethos of ‘music for all’ produces standards that are the envy of many more selective musical institutions.

Our youngest students of about six to seven years of age who have been playing for as little as two years are capable of playing as a cohesive ensemble with a great range of colour and nuance.

Throughout the age ranges and the developing maturity of our five orchestras a highly refined style of music making emerges culminating in a Chamber Orchestra who produces a ravishingly beautiful sound and a wonderful sense of ensemble and rhythm. Many of them started their musical journey in our beginner classes and have grown together over the years giving their ensemble playing an intimacy that only great friendships can enjoy.

Awards and Achievements

Youth Music Centre orchestras and ensembles have been first-prize winners in the North London Music Festival every year since 1995. In addition YMC ensembles regularly win first prizes at the Spring Grove Festival. The Youth Music Centre Children’s Choir won its first award, the Iris Macer Shield and in 2003 it had the honour of being asked to perform in ‘Youth Makes Music’ at the Royal Festival Hall.

The Chamber Orchestra has performed at the St Jude’s Proms and has given concerts at the Purcell Room at the South Bank Arts Centre, the United Reform Church, Highgate and St. Mary’s Church, Finchley and at All Saints’ Church, as part of the East Finchley Arts Festival. Since their very first successful concert at St Martin in the Fields in 2011, the Chamber Orchestra has been invited back each year. Recordings of some of those performances can be seen on this website.

Kay Hurwitz MBE

18^th March 1920 – 2^nd July 2014

Kay Hurwitz, along with three musical friends, founded the Youth Music Centre almost 50 years ago in 1967. As a lover of chamber music, Kay was a very fine professional viola player herself, she was determined to join forces with like-minded musical parents to give their children the opportunity to experience the joy of music making. At first the classes took place in her house but it soon became evident that more space was needed and the move to Bigwood House was the spring board for what we have today  – a Saturday morning music school that has welcomed hundreds of children over the years, either on their way to becoming professional musicians, or to becoming excellent amateur players and keen music lovers.

The Youth Music Centre that we all enjoy is a legacy to her love of music and her enormous enthusiasm to pass that on to the next generation. Kay was a familiar figure at YMC every Saturday morning until just a few months before she died at the age of 94 and she is remembered with great affection by all those who were lucky enough to know her.