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That mission has guided the growth of Perform 4 Purpose ever since Van Arsdale started it with his daughter Jen. A music education program that also organizes benefit concerts for local causes, Perform 4 Purpose held its first fundraiser in 2008 with students from the Jim Van Arsdale Guitar School in Auburn, and obtained nonprofit status three years later.

But, by 2019, what began as faint notes had become a crescendo. Perform 4 Purpose held 354 events last year, Van Arsdale said, including concerts, music workshops at libraries and community centers, and summer day camps at Moravia Elementary School. Those events were attended by a total of 1,744 children, Van Arsdale continued. And the benefit concerts raised $150,000 for local partners like CNY TomatoFest, Auburn Public Theater and Majorpalooza. That puts the nonprofit's total fundraising tally at $900,000, and Van Arsdale hopes to cross $1 million in 2020.

Next, Perform 4 Purpose will present its Winter Music Fest 2020 at the downtown theater on Sunday, with proceeds going to student scholarships. The event will feature about 60 student performers across three stages, Van Arsdale said, from first-timers to established local acts like duo Private Party and jazz trio Way Off Bass. Headlining will be three seniors — Dante Liberatore, Ryan Blatchley and Ryan Ratliff — who will perform some of their own individual compositions solo, as a trio, and with the rest of the 60 children in the program. 

For Van Arsdale, though, Sunday is a little ways away. Running Perform 4 Purpose has become almost a full-time job for him, totaling 20 to 30 hours on busy weeks in addition to his career teaching fifth grade at Moravia Elementary School. And that's with much more help than he had when he started the program, mostly from parents and other music teachers.

"I don't bowl, I don't golf," he said with a laugh. "It's kind of all we do."

Perform 4 Purpose's partnerships are also two-way. Its children open Auburn Public Theater's weekly Open Mic Nights and Van Arsdale collaborates on the theater's Exchange Street Records after-school music program, whose students can join Perform 4 Purpose. A new partnership with the United Way of Cayuga County made the program's summer day camp tuition-free, doubling the number of children last summer to 60. And the program is also working with Champions for Life Sports Center in Sennett to offer music education there, Van Arsdale said. 

The mission of Perform 4 Purpose is evolving, too. Van Arsdale is raising money and applying for grants to support new educational programs, like one that teaches children in third through sixth grades how to play the violin. He started the program this year because Auburn is the only school district in Cayuga County to offer an orchestra program, he continued. With the support Perform 4 Purpose received, children just had to apply to participate. Instruments and books were bought and paid for before the first note was struck, Van Arsdale said.

"I have to thank the community for the support they've given us," he said. "A day doesn't go by when someone doesn't ask us to participate in something, or give us money to buy instruments."

Van Arsdale summed up the mission of Perform 4 Purpose as "leveling the playing field." And by making music more accessible to local youth, the program helps them actualize their potential, he said. They have the passion — they introduce Van Arsdale to new artists as often as he introduces them to Louis Armstrong — and with Perform 4 Purpose, they have the support. That's what makes events like Sunday's concert so rewarding, Van Arsdale continued. There, he'll see students who timidly learned their first chords from him take the stage as confident, college-bound musicians.

"Some kids really come out of their shells and develop into outstanding leaders," Van Arsdale said. "That's why we do it. It's so worthwhile."