Companies infuse Chicago jazz scene with cash

Good developments out of the Windy City, as reported by Howard Reich in the Chicago Tribune.
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Landmark effort to benefit art form

By Howard Reich
Tribune arts critic
Published April 10, 2005

For most of a century, jazz has survived on the kindness of strangers: clubgoers, barflies and other night-lifers have provided the cash that kept the music playing.

Though the musicians typically have worked at the margins of American culture, playing mostly low-paying gigs at tiny nightspots, the art form somehow has kept swinging robustly, despite often dire financial circumstances.

But in an unprecedented development, jazz -- specifically Chicago jazz -- is about to get a large infusion of funding and opportunity.

Three Chicago-area corporations and one local foundation have joined forces to pour an estimated $1.5 million into the city's jazz scene in the next three years, with possibly more money to come during that time. Boeing Co., Bank One and Kraft Food have teamed with the non-profit Chicago Community Trust to create the Chicago Jazz Partnership, which will begin funneling approximately $500,000 into the city's jazz scene this year, with hopes of expanding that support in years to come.

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