Lawrence is not exactly known for its jazz scene.

Despite a fine jazz department at Kansas University, and a few venues that cater to the wide-ranging style, there’s not always a surplus of muted trumpets and major seventh chords to be heard within the city.

Seek plays a set of more traditional jazz music at the Coleman Hawkins Neighborhood Festival last spring in Topeka.

“I think Lawrence is really a pretty hip jazz town in comparison to Kansas City,” Nicholas Crane said. “I think it’s much more heavily progressive and open.”

Crane’s optimistic attitude led him to form the group Seek, an experimental outfit that features some of the best players, past and present, from KU’s jazz department.

Combining the extemporaneous odysseys of “Bitches Brew”-era Miles Davis with current European ambient works, Seek performs all-original compositions that take on a new life with each gig.

“Everything we do is pretty much improvisational,” said Crane, who handles saxophone, keyboards, samplers and sequencers for the act. “We might start out with a theme and then from there it’s just completely spontaneous.”

Despite indulging in tunes that hover around the 10-minute mark in length, Seek took its preliminary inspiration from a mere snippet of sound. While watching the Wesley Snipes vampire flick “Blade” (1998), Crane took notice of a brief flash of audio.

“It was when (Snipes) was in the library and listening to music on headphones,” he recalled. “It wasn’t on the soundtrack, but there was just a split second of this crazy, tranced-out music he was playing. It caught my ear and from then I really began to explore the idea of a band (more focused on) timbre delving into the possibilities and manipulation of sonic qualities.”

The members of Seek who also include keyboardist Keith Johnson, drummer Josh Adams, guitarist Trent Oehlert, bassist Brad Maestas and trumpet player Fred Mullholland all share a history with KU’s jazz department.

Johnson and Adams are completing their undergraduate degrees at the university, Mullholland worked on his graduate degree, while Oehlert received his bachelor’s. Both Maestas and Crane have “gone there off and on.”

All can agree, however, that their schooling had an influence on the formation of Seek, especially with regard to Dan Gailey, associate professor and director of jazz studies at the university.

“One of the best things about the KU department is Dan Gailey,” Crane said. “He’s just a genius and a very insightful leader. He really knows how to nurture your innate voice.”

The band plays regularly at The Jazzhaus, 926 1/2 Mass. A CD of Seek’s “electronica-meets-jazz” is in the works. And Crane envisions some other nontraditional ways for the band to spread its music.

“We’re talking about making a different compilation of bootleg recordings available at every show we play a sort of smorgasbord of our tunes that we would sell … cheap,” he said.