Qwest for Fire

Qwest TV steps outside the streaming mainstream to offer up a wider swath of multicultural live concert and documentary selections.

- MIKE METTLER

Quincy Jones has always been a maverick. The multi-hyphenate octogenarian producer/musician/conductor/director has been tireless in his decades-long quest to widen the listening base for multicultural music into as many ears and souls as he can possibly reach across the globe, genre biases are damned. At age 88, Jones continues to follow a mantra best encapsulated in a slightly modified song title from his late pop protégé Michael Jackson: don’t stop ’til you get enough listeners. And now, with his burgeoning streaming service Qwest TV making continual A/V inroads, Jones is one step closer to mass enlightenment.

Qwest TV is the logical brand extension of a pair of Jones’ other well-entrenched media conglomerates, Qwest Records and Qwest Broadcasting. Launched in 2017, Qwest TV’s goal is to be known as the “home for jazz, soul, funk, classical, and music from around the world.” In other words, while mainstream artists and their more accessible ecosystems can be found quite easily on most major streaming platforms, Qwest TV strives to dig deeper in terms of taking a more global approach to its own live performance and documentary offerings. (Currently, the service boasts over 1,300 selections to back that claim, with many more additions on the way.)