David Berger always wanted to make music.

During the '70s, he settled for making "commercial music" so he could earn a living. But that just didn't "feed (his) soul."

Nor could his stint as a commercial composer for Nabisco or his experience composing for the movie Brighton Beach Memoirs take the place of what his soul was missing:

Jazz.

"I can express myself fully with jazz," said Berger, the conductor for the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, who jokes that his jazz career really took off when he refused to buy a synthesizer.

"The commercial people stopped calling," he said.

The orchestra was created in 1988 for the Lincoln Center's Classic Jazz series and is now the official group for all jazz programs at the center.

"We first started the group to play a concert of Duke Ellington's music," Berger said. "Response was so incredible that we've continued."

As the second stop of its 30-city tour, the orchestra will perform at 8 p.m. tomorrow in Eisenhower Auditorium.

When Berger takes the stage tomorrow night, there will be one thought in his head: "I feel blessed that I have a life where I can do what I truly love to do."

And although the constant travel is tiring, he said he would not change his career.

"I'm willing to (travel) to play the music 52 weeks a year," he said.

The New York native has been into music since childhood. He studied at the Manhattan School of Music and the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y.

That education taught him the importance of experiencing jazz in person.

"Records are a poor substitute for hearing (jazz) live, or even being able to perform it," he said, adding that people are better off the more they can learn about music. "Jazz is about American ideals -- democracy and love."

There's more -- jazz is a unique American musical style built on two distinct backgrounds, African and classical music, said Dan Yoder, director of jazz studies for the University.

And the audiences are just as unique as the music itself -- jazz has no typical fan, said Carolyn Rinaldi-Lieb, publicity coordinator for the Center for Performing Arts.

There has been a resurgence in the popularity of jazz, Rinaldi-Lieb said. That interest is possible because of groups such as the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra and the work of artists such as Wynton Marsalis, she said.

And Duke Ellington, whom Berger calls perhaps the greatest jazz composer of all.

" 'A Tone Parallel to Harlem' has one melody that is so incredible that you have to wonder how one human could do that," he said.

Berger said he sees the future for jazz artists in developing a "jazz canon." He added that this must be done so traditional forms are not lost.

"It is very neccessary so that the performance of this music can continue," he said. "It is like the way that people agree that Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is a really great piece. Jazz is such a young form -- we haven't been able to decide yet."

And once the artists decide, it may be easier for more people to appreciate this diverse music.

"Some people just haven't been exposed to different types of jazz," Rinaldi-Leib said. "They may only relate to one kind of jazz."

But in State College, jazz audiences come from a cross section of the public.

"(The audience) is anyone that has an appetite for something different," she said.

Audiences should not expect to have the best seat in the house -- it is reserved for Berger.

"I get to stand in front of a band with some of the best players, and play music that I love," he said. "I mean, this is crazy!"