After accepting a certified and notarized request (click for pdf) from the Prescott Jazz Club founder and members, Milton De'Love Cannon Jr. promptly converted the club into a Jazz Society with a mission. The Prescott Jazz Society was incorporated in 1994 as a non-profit membership organization. The Society was developed as the professional entertainment component to the edu-tainment program of the Cannon Academy of Performing Art which was founded in 1993.
 
Beginning in November 1993, the continuous programs and events presented by the Prescott-Cannon organizations were able to initiate the birth of a jazz culture in the Prescott, AZ area. With tenacious commitment and passionate perseverance, Milt Cannon as President and Director of the two organizations was eventually able to establish a live-jazz presence in the area. Milt often referred to the challenge as being similar to "developing a bluegrass society in Harlem". The 1994 implementation of Prescott's first Jazz Splash Festival (a five-days and nights festival) presented in the bars and lounges of downtown Prescott was an unbelievably bold project.

Subsequently these festivals led to the opening of the Prescott Jazz Society Performance Center, a music market located at 129 1/2 No. Cortez St. (currently a popular jazz night spot). During the two-and-a-half-year tenure of the performance center coupled with the Jazz Splash Festivals, the deal was sealed. The daily music market performances of local musicians like Ramon Dana, Carlos B. Jones, Selwyn Reams, Michael (Gallarty) DeSantis and others enabled the Society to gain a substantial membership. This is when it became a fact that the presence of live jazz in Prescott had developed into a viable entertainment alternative.

By the year 2000, the PJS had co-founded the World Arts Festival in cooperation with the Town of Prescott Valley/Parks and Recreation Division. The inaugural two-day WAF event was privileged to present such jazz luminaries as Javon Jackson, Idrees Muhammad, Dwight Killian, Joseph Bonner, Pat Sherrod, Nick Brignola, Dom Moio, Jeffery Smith and Milt Cannon. There were also non-jazz performers on the bill such as the Coasters, etc. This development of the WAF event featured a two-part agreement resulting in the Town of Prescott Valley/WAF taking on the original festival dates of the PJS Jazz Splash Festival. The second part of the agreement featured the PJS and ARCOSANTI collaboration for producing the re-designed Juneteenth "Jazz Splash" Festival and Ethnic Arts Faire which continues annually each month of June.

An important and current initiative of the Prescott - Cannon organization is the instigation and promotion for the development of a certified (city supported) "Jazz Zone" in downtown Prescott, AZ. There are currently multiple jazz venues in the downtown, including the PJS weekly "Jazz Showcase" at the Hassayampa Inn, that are within walking distance of each other and similar to Jazz Scenes in other cities (though not in Arizona....yet). The development of this concept will be similar to the "Gas Light Square" of St. Louis, MO, the "Old Town" of Chicago, IL., Larimer Square of Denver, CO, and others that would enhance tourism, upgrade the economy, and increase exposure of a rare and unique Arizona jazz scene. A certified local jazz scene may help to circumvent the disgraceful need for our young "home-grown" musicians to feel that they have to go off to "far-away lands" to make a living performing jazz.