JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (WJHL) – The 7th annual Johnson City Jazz Festival is underway, with organizers saying this year is bigger and better than ever as it spans six days across multiple venues.

This year, a portion of ticket sales go toward the Jazz Foundation of America to support musicians affected by Hurricane Helene.

“It is important because I mean, like in the Asheville area, jazz musicians lost their venues to play and earn their money,” Steve Scheu, a festival organizer said. “And so, they’ve got to survive somehow. And we just felt we had this opportunity to help, you know, regional musicians overcome Helene. And so anything we can do to help, we wanted to try to help.”

Johnson City Jazz Festival’s Musical Director and performer Bill Perkins said some of the musicians affected by Helene are playing in this year’s lineup.

“Their homes were damaged,” Perkins said. “They had landslides on their property and trees down and water out and electricity out. And they were without any of that for four weeks. And they couldn’t teach lessons at their house. They couldn’t do online lessons. “

“Jazz is, people love it, but only the very top 1% make really good money. So there’s not a lot of margin for most jazz musicians when something like that happens.”

Both Scheu and Perkins believe there’s a lot of talent coming from jazz musicians in our area.

“For example, Rick Simerly from Elizabethton is a world-renowned trombonist,” Perkins said. “He’s teaching at the UNC School for the Arts right now. And he’s toured the world. He’s played in Paris. And then Justin Stanton, also from Elizabethton, is a member of Snarky Puppy.”

Justin Stanton actually made a guest appearance on day two of the festival playing along with the Jorge Garcia Quartet. They met each other just the night before.

“Here’s two world-class musicians that didn’t know each other and they run into each other at this festival,” Perkins said. “So and who knows what will come out of that. You know, they might play again somewhere.”

Perkins said these festivals give a chance for jazz musicians to connect from all over the world.

“It is really unique, a community art form and we want to keep that alive. We want to make it stronger. And it is definitely stronger than it was ten years ago. You can see it, you can talk to the audience members and they’ll tell you how good it feels to find others like them.”

The festival continues through Saturday, Sunday, and Monday and wraps up on Tuesday night with Grammy award-winning Jazz fusion band Spyro Gyra.

Community members can view a full list of the performers, venues, and set times on the Johnson City Jazz Festival’s website.

Scheu said the festival helps expose people to jazz music. Perkins agrees and invites people to come out to a weekly jazz jam session at Capone’s on Thursday nights at 7 p.m.

“If they want to get more involved in jazz if they already like it, or if they don’t even know if they like it, they should come and check it out and they can see first-class musicians here.”