Draft:The Jazz Groove

The Jazz Groove is an independent, non-commercial, internet radio station specializing in jazz music founded in June 2011. It is currently located in San Francisco, California and has been operating since March 2016 as a service of the nonprofit Foundation to Advance Jazz. The station plays mostly mellow jazz and is aimed at an audience that enjoys the kind of melodic fare one hears in smokey bars late at night or puts on during romantic, candlelight dinners.

History
The Jazz Groove traces its origins to June 2011 when it was founded as a privately owned and operated LLC. Over the years it continued to evolve and was re-launched in March 2016 by the San Francisco-based Foundation to Advance Jazz, a 501(c)(3) organization run by volunteers and freelancers, whose mission is to greatly expand the jazz audience and is dependent on donations from its listeners in order to operate.

The Jazz Groove started as a single radio station and later expanded into a network of five live streaming channels which include these four new additions: The Jazz Groove Mix #2 (includes the seasonal Christmas Jazz channel), Dreams (soft jazz for sleep), Gems (vocal jazz), and Smooth Jazz.

In September 2016, Jazz Tonight debuted, an evening program hosted by KDFC's (Classical 90.3 FM) radio personality and jazz connoisseur Ray White. KTWV's (94.7 FM The WAVE) morning host Pat Prescott and Hollywood actor Keith David, who narrated the Ken Burns' PBS documentary Jazz, also serve as the station's announcers.

The radio station receives no advertising or government funding and over the years has introduced some innovative features for non-commercial broadcasting such as a Listener Advisory Board in 2018 and giving its listeners the ability to instantly "silence" fund drive interruptions. The Jazz Groove used to broadcast free channels only, but in recent years switched to offering both free listening and premium services for those wanting the highest audio quality plus access to all the new channels. The station has also amassed a music library of over 10,000 hand-selected jazz recordings.

Format
The station is on air 24/7 and plays a collection of jazz music spanning eight decades that includes the works of timeless legends such as Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Cole Porter, Billie Holiday, George Gershwin, and Nat King Cole as well as many of today's stars like Wynton Marsalis, Diana Krall, Kurt Elling, and Joshua Redman.

The standard audio stream quality available to all listeners is in 128K AAC. For paid subscribers, its also available in both 256K AAC and the best-in-class audio fidelity FLAC.

Programming

 * Jazz Tonight with Ray White (airs on weeknights from 7 p.m. to Midnight ET/PT)
 * Freedom – The Jazz Groove Special hosted by Sheryl Lee Ralph (aired on July 4, 2018 from 12–4 p.m. ET/PT)

Reception
Pete Naughton of Britain's The Daily Telegraph put The Jazz Groove on his weekly list of best podcasts and internet radio stations in February 2013, saying "this smart jazz station from America plays everything from Oscar Peterson to Diana Krall. It has a simple, elegant site (unlike many online radio stations which are often low on information and badly designed) that makes it easy to both tune in and find out what’s been playing."

As of July 2024, The Jazz Groove has been favorited approximately 134,000 times on TuneIn.