Youth Venture

We aim to revitalize jazz culture in New York City and extend jazz to a greater public consciousness.

The mission of Search and Restore is to promote new music and make it more accessible to members outside of the immediate jazz community. Currently, the public awareness of jazz is largely limited to the expensive and tourist driven clubs (Blue Note, Village Vanguard, Iridium, etc...). People are waiting in lines out the door for great shows at the Stone, 55 Bar, and the Jazz Gallery constantly, but because of the size of those clubs, it becomes an exclusive affair, only available to other musicians, and those in the know willing to spend the time camping out.
To address the issue, we have already starting booking shows at the Knitting Factory which was initially a breeding ground for avant-garde jazz and a home base for exciting young people in the city. It has long since fallen from that pedestal due to oppression from previous financially misinformed owners and a lack of booking ability. We are bringing that music back to that space, booking double bills (a currently unheard of practice in the jazz world) and charging student rates to ensure everyone who wants to can attend and be a part of something great. The goal is community, if everyone comes to these shows and the name Search and Restore becomes recognized as a place for great new jazz, the youth will flock and the scene will flourish, making for a much needed culturally exciting environment. So far, these shows have been a huge success, with our last show in February selling out.
While our show series is underway, the next and biggest step is creating a website. The Internet is the number one place right now for music to develop and spread, and if this organization has an attractive, well designed, and interactive home base online, attendance and awareness will exponentially increase, benefiting the artists, the fans, the city, and the scene as a whole. We want to have weekly features on artists in the city, have current jazz artists publish podcasts that we host, conduct interviews, review albums, a massive section on concert photography, which has been a gorgeous staple in documenting the jazz of the past, and is necessary to artistically retain the images of jazz today. Through this website we will wave an ever-expanding palette, and a way to reach millions of people, providing new music and new live opportunities that currently are being trapped inside small walls and poor artistic models. Currently, blogs are fueling the New York rock and roll scene. There are over 100 "tastemakers" online who have millions of readers, providing them with information on new bands, music news, nightly shows, and album reviews. They are the current generation's alternative to Rolling Stone, and the jazz scene needs an alternative to Downbeat. As of now there is no online entity providing that alternative.