Five years ago, Charlie Fishman looked around Washington, D.C. and realized something was awry. Although jazz festivals can be found from Croatia to Senegal, the birthplace of musical great Duke Ellington had none to speak of. Fishman, who was Dizzy Gillespie’s personal manager and producer, was stunned.

“We are the nation’s capital, the world’s capital,” he said. “We invented this music.”

Within a year, he launched the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival, which opens its fourth year of weeklong concerts on Oct. 1 and runs through Oct. 7. The opening night lineup is led by the festival’s artistic adviser, lauded Cuban musician Paquito D’Rivera, who will perform at the invitation-only opening gala with the Turtle Island String Quartet.

Although the festival kicks off with an exclusive event, it is inclusive at its heart. Fishman, who says that jazz transcends race, religion, nationality and socioeconomic status, was determined to do his part to unify the jazz community by working with other arts organizations. As a result, the lineup includes collaborations with the National Museum of Women in the Arts, the Inter-American Development Bank and the DC Jewish Community Center. The artists also vary from traditional jazz and blues, to Afrobeat, step, Latin and gospel.

“It’s a big compliment to the D.C. area that it’s able to support something so extensive and with an amazing lineup of artists, said Rob Fox, bassist for local 13-piece Afrobeat band, Chopteeth.

Many of the programs are free to the public, and organizers try to keep the costs down for the ticketed shows, most of which run from $12 to $25. The NEA Jazz Masters concert on at 8 p.m. on Oct. 4 at the Lincoln Theater is the one exception, priced at $45.

“The jazz community is too small and too persecuted that we can afford not to help each other,” Fishman said.

The flagship event is a free jazz concert on the National Mall, starting at noon on Oct. 4. Last year, the festival drew about 30,000 jazz-lovers, and Fishman expects just as many this time around. Artists include the U.S. Army Blues band, Na’Rimbo, a marimba ensemble hailing from Mexico, and Miss Lucy Lion’s kid-friendly rhythms.

This last band represents one of the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival’s other missions: breathing life into the genre by getting young people involved. The festival’s educational program offers free concerts to D.C. students, workshops in the schools, and master classes with artists like D’Rivera.

But the main goal of the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival is to encourage the jazz scene in the Nation’s Capital. Most people don’t know how rich in talent D.C. is when it comes to jazz music, Fishman said, pointing to a little-known fact that Roberta Flack spent her formative years here.

Chopteeth is one of the local talents who will perform at the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival. Since 2004, Chopteeth has been sharing their driving rhythmic sound with audiences in the Washington area who were delighted to get a taste of West African music. Now the band is excited to share its music with a wider audience during their October 3 show at the 9:30 Club, as well as to share the stage with other local and international musicians.
As for Fishman, he’ll be thrilled if he can introduce jazz to just one more person and give D.C. the jazz scene it deserves. And it already seems to be working.

“We are seeing a renaissance of appreciation of jazz in this city,” he said.

The Duke Ellington Jazz Festival takes place Oct. 1-7. For more info, visit www.dejazzfest.org