That's probably because it is a youth orchestra, after all, and its 75 members are students in the tender youthful age range of 12 to 21. Yet their music reveals an old soul -- likely thanks to their slightly more venerable artistic director, Maestro Michael Morgan, of Oakland East Bay Symphony fame.

To share these harmonious skills with the world, the orchestra has planned a June tour of five cities in Australia and New Zealand. But it needs some help to get there.

Most members of the award-winning orchestra -- which draws students from 46 different schools throughout the Bay Area -- are able to pay their own way for the trip, but nearly a quarter of the students need partial or full scholarships to go, organizers say.

With that in mind, a birthday gala and fund-raiser will be held 5:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Waterfront Plaza Hotel at Jack London Square. The nonprofit orchestra needs to raise about $50,000 to help finance the tour.

Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown is a strong backer of the Youth Orchestra, and is scheduled to attend the gala. The Australia and New Zealand tour "opens up the world to a generation of young people, many of whom have never left the limits of the Bay Area before," he wrote in a recent letter promoting the event.

And he wants to "remind our friends 'down under' that there is a 'there,' and it is here in Oakland," he wrote. Basically, the student musicians want to go from here, which is there in the there's-no-there-there sense, to there, which to them will be here once they arrive. And then they want to come back here. Or there, as the case may be.

Anyway, the youth orchestra was founded in 1964 as the educational arm of the Oakland Symphony and has become an award-winning, highly acclaimed organization in its own right.

Orchestra members rehearse a wide range of challenging works and present several concerts each season. Various incarnations of the youth orchestra have toured the world before -- in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, the Caribbean Islands, Costa Rica, Mexico and Cuba.

The orchestra is coached by professional musicians and is supported by tuition, grants and corporate and individual contributions. Tickets for Wednesday's fund-raiser start at $50. For more information on the event or to make a donation to the orchestra, call 832-7710 or visit www.oyo.org.

The Oakland Tribune: Cityside
Leanne McLaughlin, Managing Editor
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