St. Louis, MO – October 2, 2025 – Jazz St. Louis is proud to announce that it has been awarded an $80,000 General Operating Support grant from the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis (RAC). This funding supports the organization’s efforts to bring world-class jazz performances, transformative education programs, and community engagement opportunities to the St. Louis region.
General Operating Support grants are especially meaningful to not-for-profit organizations, as they provide flexible funding to sustain essential day-to-day operations. By supporting core expenses, this support allows Jazz St. Louis to direct more of its earned revenue toward programming and innovation.
“We are grateful to the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis for their continued investment in Jazz St. Louis,”said Victor Goines, President & CEO of Jazz St. Louis. “For three decades, we've remained a home for world-class jazz of all varieties while expanding access and education to our community. General Operation Support like this is the oil that helps keep our organization moving.
Hosting over 270 performances each year, Jazz St. Louis is the foremost jazz presenter in St. Louis and throughout the region. It’s a cultural cornerstone, bringing GRAMMY winners, rising stars, and genre-defying innovators to St. Louis, while celebrating the City’s own deep-rooted jazz legacy. Hundreds of nationally-renowned musicians, such as Wynton Marsalis, Branford Marsalis, Diana Krall, Harry Connick, Jr., and Al Jarreau have graced the Jazz St. Louis stage.
Beyond the stage, Jazz St. Louis continues its longstanding commitment to education and community impact. Jazz St. Louis’s educational programs include clinics, field trips and masterclasses for young people from elementary school through college. Programs such as JazzU, artist residencies, and free community performances provide thousands of students annually with direct access to music education, mentorship, and creativity-building opportunities, ensuring jazz's future while honoring its past.
The Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis is the largest annual funder of the arts in the region, dedicated to cultivating, fostering, and promoting the arts for the benefit of the entire community. Since 2001, RAC has provided consistent and generous support to Jazz St. Louis, helping sustain its mission to advance the art form of jazz through performance, education, and community connections.
This year, RAC awarded more than $3.7 million in grants to a total of 52 local arts nonprofits producing programming with an arts focus. More information can be found here: https://racstl.org/org-grants-2025.For more information about Jazz St. Louis, visit https://jazzstl.org.
Media Contact: Serena Mounts | Leigh Walters Communications | (314) 374-2334 | serenam@lwcstrategies.com
About Jazz St. Louis
Jazz St. Louis is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to lead our community in advancing the uniquely American art of jazz through performance, education, and community engagement.
Jazz St. Louis is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to lead our community in advancing the uniquely American art of jazz through performance, education, and community engagement.
Each year, Jazz St. Louis presents over 270 performances in its internationally acclaimed concert series. The non-profit organization takes a three-pronged approach to its work: presenting jazz, encouraging and educating future audiences, and nurturing budding musicians.
Jazz St. Louis Education programs cultivate leadership and cultural appreciation in the next generation of musicians and listeners through training, educational resources, and transformative engagement with musicians from St. Louis, the U.S. and around the world.
Jazz St. Louis has an extensive portfolio of education programs aimed at elementary through college students in the greater St. Louis area and beyond. The organization provides field trip experiences, hands-on training programs, in-school clinics and masterclasses, and curricular resources for teachers, all at no cost to participants.
