Isaiah Grigg of MusicBreeds seeks to inspire and mentor aspiring musicians and creatives. NewsdayTV’s Steve Langford reports. Credit: Debbie Egan-Chin

Five young men sat around a white dry-erase board in Hempstead on Monday discussing ideas about how they would launch an app for a hypothetical startup.

The app, dubbed Radar, “will help artists, musicians to promote their music, pretty much like a TikTok for music,” said Stephen Brown, 21, of Roosevelt, one of the five who attended the class called Rhythm Reach. The plan is to get $750,000 in venture capital, hire staff, develop and test the app and then promote it over four quarters.

 "It's what happens in the real world when it comes to CEOs, CFOs, COOs on the entrepreneurial side and what to expect," Brown said.

The app is used as a tool in a one-month class to teach 16-24 year-olds how to plan and run a business — in or out of the music industry. It's the first class to get started at the MusicBreeds Arts Hub, founded by musician and singer Isaiah Grigg to use the arts as a path to guide young people to career and personal success.

MusicBreeds Arts Hub

  • 24,000 square foot center
  • Opened in October in Hempstead
  • Offers instruction in music, technology and workforce development
  • Develops music technology programs for schools

Source: MusicBreeds

“These guys are young entrepreneurs,” said Hisken Isaac, their instructor and managing director of programming at the MusicBreeds Arts Hub, which opened the center in October.

The class is paid for using federal funds under contract with HempsteadWorks Career Center for workforce training that targets young people who are out of school and is just one of the planned offerings at the 24,000 square foot facility that is still being equipped and finished. The center has nine classrooms, an orchestral room, computer labs and a recording studio. The center is now enrolling students through its websites and offers classes including music lessons, computer science, digital audio recording, preparation for GED and SAT, and after school programs. 

Though the workforce training program is free for eligible people, other classes and programs cost between $45 to $750.

The freshly painted walls, still plastic-sealed digital keyboards and dangling cables at the center are a prelude to what's to come.

Isaiah Grigg teaches a class at the MusicBreeds Arts Hub.

Isaiah Grigg teaches a class at the MusicBreeds Arts Hub. Credit: Debbie Egan-Chin

“We wanted to start with a blank slate,” Grigg, of Huntington, said as he walked around the sprawling and as yet unadorned space. The look and feel of the spaces will evolve over time so that murals are painted to fit the uses of the different classrooms to be “kind of organically grown” and “take on a different vibe and culture.”

Grigg, 41, a retired NYPD detective and former naval reservist, tapped into his difficult upbringing in Bellport to build out a vision of mentoring young lives. Embracing the opportunities in tech is part of that vision.

“I love my trombone, but I was also interested in being the next Prince or Herbie Hancock and getting that digital synth, that different sound but they didn't have this available,” Grigg said. Learning how to use a digital audio work station is becoming an essential part of music education, he said. “No matter what type of musician you are, if you're going to be recording it, you have to be aligned with some of the production qualities that you're going to be doing.”

He started the nonprofit in 2014, working out of the Restoration Christian Ministries church in the Bronx to provide music classes on weekends.

"His impact has been systemic because not only is he reaching the congregation with his musical talents but he's also training and developing the adults and the young people," the church's Rev. Keith L. Campbell said of Grigg, adding that he continues to be active in the church musically with its choir and working with special needs children in the congregation.

Grigg's work with youth at the church helped "get them to develop their own skills and, particularly in that urban setting of the Bronx, to get them to focus on activities other than street activities," Campbell said.

The name MusicBreeds is about personal transformation, Grigg said, about “breeding the idea that can navigate you away from the circumstance someone is in."

Grigg grew up in what he called a "single parent" environment with a mother who struggled to put food on the table. 

 “I was an angry kid,” Grigg said. “I was upset that I didn't have the support. I was resentful of my mom because she couldn't do everything that I needed her to.”

“Everything was about stability and nothing was about what actually do I love,” Grigg said. Music was his outlet, starting with his first love, piano and expanding to trombone, drums and gospel singing. “It [music] gave me a way to express myself because otherwise I was very isolated, very quiet and very angry.”

“As a Black man, how many opportunities did I have to say I'm depressed or I have anxiety or I need certain services or I just need somebody to talk to me?” Grigg said.

As he got older he started to ask himself, “What opportunities am I missing because I have tunnel vision?”

The organization’s services are funded through donations, contracts and grants, including a grant from The Les Paul Foundation which helps fund innovative music production and performance programs.

Grigg hopes the hub will be the first of three such centers on Long Island.

“Hempstead is vibrant,” Grigg said. “It still has a lot of potential. There is a strong population of students and individuals here that need services like these.”

His goal is to nurture young lives to reach beyond their circumstances.

“I don't want them to just try stuff. I want them to be guided,” Grigg said. “Everybody's going to make their mistakes and they're going to go about life in their journeys, but I just don’t believe in the concept that experience is the only teacher.”

FAA data analyzed by Newsday shows the number of bird strikes voluntarily reported by airports in New York City and Long Island has increased by 46% between 2009 and 2023. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn reports.  Credit: Newsday/File Footage; Photo Credit: AP Photo/Steven Day, Bebeto Matthews; Getty Images

'A different situation at every airport' FAA data analyzed by Newsday shows the number of bird strikes voluntarily reported by airports in New York City and Long Island has increased by 46% between 2009 and 2023. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn reports.

FAA data analyzed by Newsday shows the number of bird strikes voluntarily reported by airports in New York City and Long Island has increased by 46% between 2009 and 2023. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn reports.  Credit: Newsday/File Footage; Photo Credit: AP Photo/Steven Day, Bebeto Matthews; Getty Images

'A different situation at every airport' FAA data analyzed by Newsday shows the number of bird strikes voluntarily reported by airports in New York City and Long Island has increased by 46% between 2009 and 2023. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn reports.

SUBSCRIBE

Unlimited Digital AccessOnly 25¢for 6 months

ACT NOWSALE ENDS SOON | CANCEL ANYTIME