South Carolina · Nonprofit
Colour of Music
Colour of Music (South Carolina) receives grants from 17 organizations whose IRS filings report $798,966 to it, the largest being South Arts Inc ($349,666). 7 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $540k
- Funders on record
- 17
- Grants received
- $799k
- Net assets
- $-81096
What Colour of Music does
Mission
To provide distinctive, extraordinary opportunities for composers, musicians, and vocalists of African descent to present a wide-ranging repertoire of classical music to the public.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Program
The Colour of Music Festival, Inc. presents a diverse classical repertoire of baroque, classical and 20th-century music at the highest of musical standards to diverse audiences nationally. The festival has presented in Atlanta, Georgia; Charleston and Columbia, South Carolina; Nashville, Tennessee; Houston; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Richmond, Virginia; Washington, D.C.; Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Sacramento, California. Few classical music enthusiasts are aware of the tremendous contributions of Le Chevalier de Saint-Georges, an African-French composer whose opera and classical masterpieces equaled or far exceeded those of his 18th- century contemporaries. Although his compositions are highly recognized overseas, they have gathered little notice in the United States. Today there are thousands of celebrated and prodigiously talented classical principals, composers and performers of African descent throughout the world. Yet, their opportunities to grace concert stages of major American orchestras are rare to non-existent. The Colour of Music Festivals mission is reversing this trend. Since 2013, the Colour of Music Festival offers a musical kaleidoscope highlighting the impact and…
$464,260 spent$21,308 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $464,260.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2020, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2020, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2021 to 2022, from $106k to $25k (−76%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2021 57% · 2022 9% · 2023 21% · 2024 14%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
96% of Colour of Music’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (64% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 5 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Board chair
Wendell Lucas
Chair
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 2 funders to 8 funders, grant income rose $102k → $234k.
5 of 17 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 35% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of Colour of Music’s funders (the co-funder graph). Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
Colour of Music leans on a few funders — its largest provides 44% of grant income and the top three 72%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left
88% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund Colour of Music.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 99% · 2018 86% · 2019 62% · 2020 57% · 2021 54% · 2022 96% · 2023 67% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
13% of Colour of Music's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 41% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
Colour of Music draws 95% of its grant income from funders outside South Carolina, across 7 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $282k arriving through sponsors registered in 5 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
Colour of Music has grown faster than three-quarters of the 17,936 arts & culture nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 17,936 arts & culture nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2024
Government funding Colour of Music receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $205k on record.
- National Endowment for the Arts$205k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like Colour of Music
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In South Carolina
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
92% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
100%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Colour of Music: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds Colour of Music?
- Colour of Music (South Carolina) receives grants from 17 organizations whose IRS filings report $798,966 to it, the largest being South Arts Inc ($349,666). 7 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Colour of Music have?
- IRS filings report 17 organizations giving $798,966 in grants to Colour of Music, 7 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Colour of Music?
- South Arts Inc is the largest funder on record, with $349,666 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Colour of Music find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in South Carolina. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Colour of Music →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2020–2024), and the filings of 17 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing