The Los Angeles Philharmonic has found a permanent home in Inglewood after funds were used to flip a former bank into a musical hub for the area’s youth.
According to the Los Angeles Sentinel, YOLA will provide “intensive music training,” alongside academic support for students between the ages of 5-18. It will be a musical home to 1,000 students, and the facility says applicants are only required to have a “love of the arts.”
The Judith and Thomas L. Beckman Center is the first space in the YOLA. Construction began on the facility in 2019, and the cost is estimated to be $14.5 million.
The cutting-edge design came courtesy of revered architect Frank Gehry — who designed Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao
The design is nothing short of state of the art.
The center is headed by the Music and Artistic Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Gustavo Dudamel.
“As a young child in Venezuela, I joined El Sistema and learned firsthand that music has the power to change people’s lives. Now, the LA Phil is doing just that through YOLA. We know that our engagement with young people in our classes in the Rampart District or East L.A. is every bit as important as our involvement with the audiences in Walt Disney Concert Hall,” Dudamel said in a statement.
“In fact, one side of what we do is incomplete without the other. That’s why it’s so important to build this permanent home for YOLA, and why I’m so grateful to Frank Gehry for understanding the LA Phil’s hopes and the dreams of our student,” he said.
