Saturday school: how sweet the sound

Rev. Nathaniel Dixon may be the only pastor in the city that has Miles, the autobiography of Miles Davis, on the same bookshelf as religious texts like St. Augustine’s Confessions.

A Saturday morning at St. Stephen’s United Methodist Church means music of all types bouncing around the old church’s walls; a young saxophone player stumbling through scales, a skilled pianist working out a Scott Joplin song.

Drum lessons take place in the main church near the alter. Piano, guitar, vocal and songwriting classes take place in nearby prayer rooms. Rev. Dixon teaches woodwinds in his office, which is filled with amps, cymbals, sheet music and Fender guitar stickers.

Rev. Dixon started St. Stephen’s Saturday Music School six years ago with only three students. Now, 26 students of all ages, from elementary school students to baby boomers, attend the church regularly to learn from one of the eight teachers.

When 15-year-old Atiim Keita messes up a note on his saxophone, Rev. Dixon calls him a “turkey.”

“Breathe!” Rev. Dixon, who is one of the teachers, said to Atiim on May 5 in his office. “If you don’t breathe, you’ll kill yourself.”

Atiim stood in front of sheet music and Rev. Dixon stood beside him like a drill sergeant, pointing to the notes and singing them. When Atiim worked on John Coltrane’s “Equinox,” Rev. Dixon picked up a tenor sax and joined his student. Atiim is practicing the Coltrane tune for the St. Stephen’s Saturday Music Academy’s annual recital, which will take place at the Marble Hill church on Saturday, May 19, at 6 p.m.

During the lesson, Rev. Dixon tried out multiple forms of encouragement. He told Atiim to “man up” and play. He said with practice he could pay gigs to make money for school or for taking a girl out on a date. He said music could take Atiim across the world, like it did for him, at which Atiim rolled his eyes.