Before he graduated from Pittsburgh High School for Creative and Performing Arts, Dean Alston Jr. had been to 30 funerals for Beltzhoover family and friends who were murdered. Soon after, he left Pittsburgh to pursue his musical dream in New Orleans.

Now 46, he’s back and looking forward to playing with his band, Brass Holio, at 1:30 p.m. Sunday as part of this weekend’s Beltzhoover Community Day. The free concert is in McKinley Park, 900 Delmont Ave. 15210.

Music means salvation to Alston, who came from a musical family. His grandfather played trumpet, piano and all the brass instruments; his father played marimba, vibraphone and percussion.

He was intrigued by trumpet when he saw one at his grandpa’s house. It wasn’t as intimidating as the flute with its many buttons and it wasn’t as heavy as the French horn. He quickly learned all the scales. Neighbors sometimes bet that he couldn’t learn a song in a day, but he always surprised them and won a few bucks.

In third grade, the other kids sometimes picked on the little light-skinned kid with green eyes walking around the neighborhood with a trumpet in his hands. He ended up in a lot of fights that left him with many scars.

“It was worth it in the end because I stayed true to what I like and what I love to do,” he said.

As Alston got better at playing trumpet, the tables turned. Instead of teasing him, people started asking him what he was going to play next. At age 13, he started performing in other parts of the city and he later joined the high school marching band.

After graduation, he wanted to go to college. He could have attended the University of Pittsburgh or Penn State, he said, but he wanted to escape this city. So he went to the University of New Orleans.

Always the best trumpet player in high school, he was challenged by a new music style — New Orleans jazz — and his more versatile peers. People would ask him, “What else do you play?”

“I thought what do you mean? It’s hard enough to play the trumpet,” Alston said.

To catch up, he spent six hours in the practice room every day, which left little time for math and history classes. He was much more interested in playing “Joy Spring” for jazz heavyweights like Ellis Marsalis.

Alston fell in love with New Orleans jazz, playing it at weddings, funerals, clubs and parties. He hasn’t found one occasion that he can’t liven up with music.

“People dance and have fun. When I play, I get a reaction from the crowd. They sing with me, they clap, they get up, they dance, they have a good time. They're not just sitting there looking at me like I'm an exhibit in a museum.” he said.

Alston eventually moved to Houston, where he got married, bought a house and started a family. But he couldn’t escape his Pittsburgh memories.

“I'm from Beltzhoover. I'm an inner-city kid. That will never be out of me. … I’m educated, but that's what I am. That's where I come from,” he said.

In 2018, he performed in Harlem’s famous Apollo Theater in New York City. The Jazz Foundation of America gala concert was a highlight of his musical career. But his world fell apart a few months later. His marriage ended, he started drinking and he got into trouble.

In and out of hospitals, he began living on the streets, scrambling to survive. He remembers standing under a bridge with cockroaches crawling on his legs, feeling like everything that he had was slipping through his fingers and he couldn't do anything to stop it.

He stopped playing music. He began working in a restaurant kitchen and as a janitor in a school. Each paid him $10 per hour.

Alston began to put his life back together in October 2021. He went to Louisiana to see his kids and stopped in New Orleans, a place that brought him a rush of emotions. In November, he returned to Pittsburgh with a duffel bag, two pairs of pants, one pair of underwear, no trumpet and $50 in his pocket.

Then he found his music again, or maybe it found him. While painting a house, he was given a trumpet. After months of practice, he started a New Orleans-style brass band, Brass Holio, with Andrew Hook, a 27-year-old tuba player. They lined up as many gigs as possible. 

During his darkest days, Alston realized how much music and Beltzhoover had shaped his life. He wants to create a performing arts center where inner-city kids like him can learn. He wants them to know that they are talented and that life has infinite possibilities if you are willing to work hard. 

The center, which is still in fundraising stage, would be a place where young people can come after school to do their homework and play music, he said. Alston envisions a gallery to showcase local artists’ work, dance nights on Thursdays and Fridays and a gospel brunch on Sundays. He wants to make the center free of charge.

“If I didn't play music, I would have never left,” he said. “I'd probably be dead or maybe would even kill somebody, to be honest with you. I would have never gone to university. I would have never met the people. I wouldn't have my family. I wouldn't have my children,” Alston said.

“Music saved my life. I owe it big time so I’m paying back my debt.”

Hannah Qu: hqu@post-gazette.com.

First Published: July 15, 2022, 10:00 a.m.
Updated: July 15, 2022, 10:02 a.m.