Qwest TV, the music channel launched by Quincy Jones and Reza Ackbaraly in summer 2020, is making an archive of over 1300 concert and music documentary films available free of charge for schools, colleges, conservatories, public libraries, universities and other educational institutions via its educational programme.

Jones and his partner in Qwest TV, French music producer and aficionado Reza Ackbaraly, have been curating a growing catalogue of films for streaming in response to the lack of range in music programming on the web.

As Jones says, ‘Much to our collective disservice, the United States in the only country without a Minister of Culture, and this communal inattentiveness to our roots has been detrimental to our individual and collective understanding of identity.

‘So, it absolutely brings me a great deal of joy to announce that we will be giving out free access to our Qwest TV Educational Platform to all willing elementary-high schools, music schools, colleges and universities from all over the world.

‘We want each kid and student to be able to freely explore their musical history by rediscovering their roots, both through jazz and beyond.’

Not surprisingly, considering Quincy Jones’ remarkable background as a jazz player, arranger, composer and producer, Qwest’s first love has been jazz. But Jones was also trained by Nadia Boulanger, who taught Stravinsky, Glass and Bernstein, leading him into his career as a film music composer. That, plus Ackbaraly’s Indian heritage, has led to Qwest expanding into a diverse catalogue of great classical performances and documentaries from around the world, including Indian ragas, African drum orchestras and choruses and Caribbean rhythms.

With Qwest TV Mix, Qwest TV Jazz and Beyond and now Qwest TV Classical, the platform now attracts over 10 million unique monthly viewers.