S.F.’s St. John Coltrane Church fights eviction

The Rev. Marlee-I Mystic is a minister at St. John Coltrane African Orthodox Church in San Francisco. The Rev. Marlee-I Mystic is a minister at St. John Coltrane African Orthodox Church in San Francisco. Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, Special To The Chronicle Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 45 Caption Close S.F.’s St. John Coltrane Church fights eviction 1 / 45 Back to Gallery

The St. John Coltrane African Orthodox Church, a uniquely San Franciscan storefront ministry dedicated to the music and preachings of the soulful sax man, is facing eviction and may be gone as soon as Sunday’s sermon ends.

Archbishop Franzo W. King, who co-founded the Fillmore district church, says he has received a three-day notice to vacate the space in the West Bay Conference Center, a meeting hall for hire. King says the center’s director, Floyd Trammell, has not accepted his rent of $1,600 per month for two years, and King is now waiting for the sheriff to serve eviction papers.

To build support, the one-room storefront, commonly known as the Church of John Coltrane, has circulated a petition through its website and claims 1,174 signatures.

“As a community here, we might be looked at as one of the last cultural voices that has a certain social consciousness that leads toward the favor of the oppressed,” said King, 71, in an interview Wednesday at the church.

Founded in 1968, the church is said to be the only house of worship in the United States dedicated to the message and music of John Coltrane, the pioneering jazz musician who died in 1967. The sanctuary looks more like a jazz club than a church, with only glass doors separating the 50-seat room from the pedestrian traffic on Fillmore Street.

Once aligned with the Black Panthers, the church preaches its gospel in a weekly radio ministry on KPOO-FM, and sponsors food and clothing giveaways. But its main event is a Sunday morning meditation on Coltrane’s signature work “A Love Supreme,” followed by a sermon punctuated with musical accompaniment by the ensemble the Ministers of Sound.

“This church in its own unique characteristics is an institution that belongs to San Francisco,” King said. “I don’t think we could have done this anywhere else when we started ... 48 years ago, to have a religious community that is global and all-inclusive and at the same time bringing attention to the power of the artistic expressions of jazz.”

Speaking in a voice that could barely be heard above the piped-in sound of a Coltrane solo on CD, King railed against market forces at work in the Western Addition, as the Fillmore has come to be known. First went Marcus Books, which the Coltrane Church fought to save, and now it looks like the church is on its way out.

“Our concern primarily is what is happening to the African American community,” King said. “The out-migration of not just residents but spiritual and cultural institutions, almost without impunity, being allowed to be devastated by profit motivations.”

3-day notice

King said the church has been on a month-to-month lease for five years and was given a three-day notice to vacate the space in September. He said the conference center’s director has not accepted rent from the church since 2014. This is usually perceived as a step toward eviction. King expects a visit from a sheriff’s deputy to force eviction proceedings “any day now.”

Reached by phone, the director, Trammell, had no comment and referred calls to attorney William Lynn, at the firm Fried & Williams. At press time, Lynn had not returned voice and e-mail requests for comment left by The Chronicle.

Supervisor London Breed, who represents the Western Addition, has been trying to broker a solution between the church and the conference center. However, she said there is not much she can do.

“This is private property,” she said, “but it is a messy story because I care about them both.”

Church’s history

It is also a long story, going back to the mid-1960s when King operated his Potrero Hill apartment as a listening venue for jazz records, called the Jazz Club. After Coltrane died, the Jazz Club became the Yardbird Club, and as King evolved in his worship of Coltrane it became Yardbird Temple, then One Mind Temple, then One Mind Temple Evolutionary Transitional Body of Christ.

One Mind Temple became involved with Alice Coltrane, the musician’s widow, who had founded the Vedantic Center in Southern California. She later sued One Mind Temple for $7.5 million, claiming it was using the Coltrane name unlawfully to raise money.

In 1981, an emissary from the African Orthodox Church was sent to San Francisco to invite One Mind Temple into its fold, as the One Mind Temple Episcopate African Orthodox Church, which ultimately became St. John Will-I-Am Coltrane African Orthodox Church.

Compared to its name changes, the church has been more stable in locations. First located on the corner of Divisadero and Oak, it lost that space to a rent spike, from $250 a month to $2,500. Then it shared space with another church at Gough and Turk, before landing at Fillmore and Eddy 10 years ago.

Jazz vanishes

The church sits within what was once highly touted as the Historic Fillmore Jazz Preservation District. But one by one the jazz has disappeared from the area. Rasselas Jazz Club and Restaurant folded in 2013. Yoshi’s San Francisco, a polished two-story club that opened to enormous fanfare in 2007, limped along for six years, then tried its own name change to the Addition, before folding a year ago.

The Historic Fillmore Jazz Preservation District handle is no longer in use, and aside from restaurant entertainment, about all that is left of jazz in the Fillmore is the drum kit inside the St. John Coltrane African Orthodox Church.

“We’ve got people coming from all over the world every week. It’s like a pilgrimage place,” King said. “In that sense, it is a great tragedy if we are not able to survive in the climate that many are being faced with at this time.”

Sam Whiting is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: swhiting@sfchronicle.com