Bio

Born and raised in Oakland, California, saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer Nathan Nakadegawa-Lee embodies a striking mix of sounds deriving from improvised, vocal, blues, and jazz traditions. He is a graduate of The New School’s Jazz and Contemporary Music program, where he studied with luminaries such as Melissa Aldana, Darius Jones, Tivon Pennicott, David Glasser, Or Bareket, Jon Irabagon, Anat Cohen, Joshua Rubin, and Ismail Lumaneovsky. In Oakland, Nathan has taught at Oakland Summer Music, Oakland Public Conservatory, and his alma mater Claremont Middle School, providing music education at no cost to middle schoolers. 

As a performer, Nathan has appeared alongside generational artists such as Billy Martin, Faye Carol, Azure McCall, Selendis Sebastian Alexander Johnson, and Lesley Mok. He has performed internationally in Tokyo, and the Bern Jazz Festival in Switzerland, in the Bay Area at Yoshi’s Oakland, and The Soundroom, and NYC at Dizzy’s Jazz Club, The Stone, and Le Poisson Rouge. A big supporter of community organizing, Nathan hosts eclectic house shows and Improv Nights, and continues to compose, improvise, and perform in New York City and the Bay Area.

Teaching Info

As a teacher, I always try to focus on what the student is passionate about, while keeping in mind their weaknesses or aversions. When I was a student, the most profound growth I experienced was when I was fully engaged in the act of music making. I want to guide my students along a path to fall in love with music, whatever form that may come in. I know this will be much more valuable than any technique or song I could ever teach them. While I know this is the goal, I am also aware that this won’t happen with every student. Often this process happens further down the line. In those cases I just want them to get the most they can out of music, and enjoy the process of growing as a musician and a person. 

It is very important to me to teach music to a diverse community of students. This is how I grew up learning music, and it truly is a way of bringing communities together. It has also been my privilege as a teacher to serve many underprivileged communities (as a part of Oakland Summer music, and Oakland Public Conservatory), as I believe everyone deserves access to quality music education.

 In my private or group lessons, I like to first gauge the students’ listening habits and any music they are listening to. In my experience with younger students, many of them have yet to start listening to music on their own. I try to provide them a space to just listen to music. This way we can work on their technique through music they already enjoy. I will often have them learn songs by ear while also working on some fundamentals such as scales or tonging. We would also work on whatever weaknesses the student may have in their own public music programs or in their other music making. Often that is reading, ear training, or general lack of knowledge. I am always happy to work on these things in a patient but challenging manner. While improvement is the goal, I know first hand that failure is an important and essential part of the learning process.