Story by Marcia Fuller of ETruth.com:
MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- Stephen Foster grew up surrounded by music.
"All of my aunts and uncles either sang or played," said the New Orleans sax man who has focused his life on bringing music to young people.
"My mom was an elementary education teacher," he said. "She also had a beauty shop on Rampart Street, right next door to a speakeasy where musicians had 'blowouts' (aka jam sessions). As a kid, I heard Louis Armstrong, Thomas Jefferson and Sidney Bechet."
The influence of these jazz greats has stayed with Foster during his years as a performer and teacher.
So has the impact of the silver dollars from "an old guy with a cane and a dog" who came "once or twice a month" into the barbershop where Stephen shined shoes. The young boy saved those dollars, which helped fund his first school, and later discovered he had been "collaborating" with Wynton Marsalis' grandfather.
At 13, Foster was playing on Bourbon Street when the founder of an African American school, who also went to his church, informed the teen that he was ready to teach.
"I had five students on Saturday morning," Foster recalled. "But they weren't all sax players."
It was then he realized he could earn a living not just by performing.
After high school and the University of Arkansas in Pine Bluff, where he studied music education, Foster then was commissioned to put together a "New Orleans band" to entertain workers on the Alaska pipeline. Foster and his band, Below Zero, traveled Alaska for a year. He then moved to California because "I thought if I could read music I could get work," he said.
Instead, Foster found himself knocking on doors, a la "The Music Man," and offering to give lessons in the homes. After a week, he had 60 students and a trunk full of instruments rescued from attics and garages.
"They called me the Pied Piper," Foster laughed.
After two months, fate stepped in again via the father of a student. Noting that the young teacher "must be tired" of his house-to-house teaching route, Jules Batiste learned of his dream to acquire some space for a music school.
"He took me to a bank," Foster said. "I waited in the car. He came out with a box. It had $20,000 in cash inside. He told me it was not a loan. He said 'Just take the money and do what you said.'"
Clutching the box, Foster took the bus home.
A gutted space in a shopping mall, refurbished with a crew sent by architect Batiste, became his first school. "We had soundproof walls for different instruments," he recalled, adding that the student body soon numbered 360.
That was Foster's business until 1983. "Los Angeles kids were not interested in learning and paying their dues," he said. "They all wanted to grab the mics and do rap and hip hop and be stars."
He returned to New Orleans, but "I did not go home rich," Foster said. "I was almost broke."
Again, a benefactor stepped in.
Robert McFarland, whose day job had nothing to do with music, wanted to be the manager of a Big Band. "He told me he would finance my school if I would organize that band," Foster said.
The Stephen Foster Big Band was born, and the school was on again. It started small and soon had almost 100 students, but now included drama, dance, arts and crafts. Foster also sold instruments and served as a drop-off point for repair work.
Foster now had a family. Wife Joycelyn, a bass player and former education director for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, a son and daughter and three grandchildren.
Once again, however, tragedy struck. Its name was Hurricane Katrina.
"We have to be prepared to move because of my son," Foster said. Kwame, who has muscular dystrophy, is on a life-support ventilator which has a brief extended battery life. "We have evacuated three times since last December," Foster said.
They were packed up but reluctant to leave. Nevertheless, very late on Aug. 29, the Fosters started west, heading for relatives in Texas. The immensity of the traffic jam made them decide to change direction, and they turned east, ending up finally at the Clarion Airport Hotel in Memphis, where the hotel manager and area churches opened their doors and hearts.
"We were in Memphis two weeks when I realized I had no income," Foster said.
He turned to the Band Director's Academy at Lincoln Center, with which he had been involved for five years. A letter went out to other academy members and Concord High School's Steve Peterson, who is a member of Truth in Jazz, was among the first to respond.
The result is a way to help the Fosters via his first love: music.
The Truth in Jazz concert planned for Nov. 12 will feature the hardy sax player as soloist. He and his family are still in Memphis, but he has returned to New Orleans several times, to discover that 90 percent of the instruments -- valued at $40,000 to $50,000 -- have been ruined, and his studio is still filled with water. All they have is what they took with them.
The real downside: No insurance.
But, like another "unsinkable," Stephen Foster ain't down yet!
"I plan to go back to New Orleans and continue what I was doing," Foster said. "The quality of education we offer -- a lot of it free -- is not readily available in New Orleans."
Until then, Foster is starting a program in 500 square feet of space in Memphis' Galloway United Methodist Church.
Not incidentally, the sax medley he will play Nov. 12 is titled "Gospel According to Jazz."
For additional information visit www.thefosterfamilyprograms.org and www.etruth.com
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