The festival, created in the late 1960s, was conceived with the idea of bringing together youth orchestras from all over the world at a festival using music as a unifying bond to promote international understanding. The first International Festival of Youth Orchestras was held in 1969 in St Moritz in Switzerland and in 1973 moved to the UK and established a base both in Aberdeen and London for the following five years. Due to the facilities and local support in the City of Aberdeen and its University, the Festival was able to expand to incorporate all forms of dance, jazz and choral music. In 1979 the management decided to focus this international event entirely in Aberdeen with groups touring to venues throughout the North East of Scotland. In the early 1980s Aberdeen City Council formed the Aberdeen Music Festival Trust to take over the management of this major international cultural event. Nicola Wallis, who had been associated with IFYO since 1973, was appointed Director and the name of the Festival changed to the Aberdeen International Youth Festival. Over the past 20 years the Festival has expanded and developed to incorporate two summer schools - The Splore Scottish Traditional Music School and the Dance Summer School. The Festival also ran the Shell Expro Music School and the Aberdeen Youth Choir, a visual arts programme and a multi arts project involving local young disabled people. In 2004 it launched a pilot Music Theatre Course, and the success of this has led to them opening the course to local people aged 12+ for 2004.

The international reputation of the Aberdeen International Youth Festival enables it to attract the world's leading youth arts groups and to stage one of the world's premier participatory festivals. The Festival boasts a programme of prestigious performances in Aberdeen's major venues such as His Majesty's Theatre and the Music Hall; a touring programme taking performances to rural venues across North East Scotland; a fringe programme in community venues throughout Aberdeen; the Splore - a traditional music summer school; Scotland’s’ leading dance summer school, and Opera Garden, a project bringing together young singers from around the world, to create a full scale opera production in just three weeks.

The festival in 2004 featured leading ballet schools from Asia and Europe; European choirs; some of the most exciting orchestral groups from Europe and the Far East and leading international youth ensembles from Europe, North America, Asia and Africa.