Washington · Nonprofit
Music Center of the Northwest
Music Center of the Northwest (Washington) receives grants from 20 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,635,843 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($470,319). 13 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $1.3M
- Funders on record
- 20
- Grants received
- $1.6M
- Net assets
- $2.6M
What Music Center of the Northwest does
Mission
Music Center of the Northwest is a nonprofit community music school located in North Seattle. We believe in the transformative power of music in the lives of people and our community. (Continued on Sch O)
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Music Instruction: Music Center provides individual and group instruction to students of all ages and abilities. Individual instruction is offered for harp, koto, piano, music theory/composition and all brass, woodwind and string instruments. Group classes are offered for Choirs, Music Together, Jazz Combos, Orchestra, Saxophone Ensembles and Suzuki Violin. In 2024-2025 Music Center saw record enrollment with over 800 participants each week.
$988,057 spent$1,071,920 earned by the program89% of program spendingMusic Therapy: Music Therapy specializes in working with people of all ages, including neurodiverse children, teens and adults, in particular those who have received a diagnosis of Autism, ADHD, or Down Syndrome. We work with older adults experiencing dementia, Alzheimers Disease, Parkinsons Disease, and other neurodegenerative diseases. Areas of focus focus may include language and self-expression, motor coordination, academic skills, self-advocacy and other goals, all while recognizing and building on each clients unique strengths and abilities.
$57,184 spent5% of program spendingOutreach: Educational Outreach programming, such as partnerships with Seattle Public Library and local schools, brings free weekly music programming to over 300 students, sparking their passion for music and creative expression.
$39,003 spent4% of program spendingAround The Sound
$15,942 spent1% of program spendingEmerald City Womens Chorus
$11,492 spent$2,247 earned by the program1% of program spending
The 5 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $1,111,678.
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.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2020 to 2021, from $2.3M to $2.8M (+25%).
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: 2020 30% · 2021 9% · 2023 0%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 2 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.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 3 funders to 11 funders, grant income rose $61k → $144k.
5 of 20 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 42% 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 Music Center of the Northwest’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
Music Center of the Northwest leans on a few funders — its largest provides 29% of grant income and the top three 69%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left
47% 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 Music Center of the Northwest.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 47% · 2018 86% · 2019 43% · 2020 46% · 2021 58% · 2022 51% · 2023 36% — 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
45% of Music Center of the Northwest's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 65% 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
84% of Music Center of the Northwest's grant income comes from Washington funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $688k 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.
Organizations like Music Center of the Northwest
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 Washington
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
73% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Music Center of the Northwest: 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 Music Center of the Northwest?
- Music Center of the Northwest (Washington) receives grants from 20 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,635,843 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($470,319). 13 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Music Center of the Northwest have?
- IRS filings report 20 organizations giving $1,635,843 in grants to Music Center of the Northwest, 13 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Music Center of the Northwest?
- FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND is the largest funder on record, with $470,319 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Music Center of the Northwest find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Washington. 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 Music Center of the Northwest →
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 20 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