(smooth jazz music) - Music is a very subjective experience, always.

I think that keeps us from crossing that line into having discussions where we elevate certain works of art or certain cultural groups over others.

I grew up in a mostly black neighborhood.

My parents were born and raised in Haiti.

I had a lot of R&B, hip-hop influences, but also a lot of Caribbean music.

Having all of those things kind of swirl around me, it gave me an opportunity to see music from different standpoints.

When we teach music we're only given the classical examples.

And we're only given the classical examples from certain European composers.

And what happens is a lot of other music gets left out of the equation because they feel as though it's not as serious.

(smooth jazz music) I want students to have open minds about the types of pieces that they discover, and the types of things that they think are worthy of serious or critical study.

I want students to be able to pick up a piano sonata from a classical composer and to also be able to pick up a track from Miles Davis with the same level of intensity and the same level of rigor.

So the students aren't seeing it as like, this token thing, well, we did classical, and this one day we did some rag time, or some jazz or I brought in Beyonce or something.

It's more of presenting it all as a bigger world of what we just call music.

We can incorporate more people into this rich tradition of making music, try to incorporate more community members into discussion and branch out.

And also recognize anti-racism, being able to look at the structures that uphold these things that we want to get rid of, and realizing that if we don't focus on that that we're basically gonna keep, you know, singing the same tune.

(upbeat jazz music)