♪ ...I guess it's speedy.

I guess it's speedy ♪ ♪ Here for one reason to get ♪ you to have feeling, come on ♪ ♪ We on top... ♪ - That's my vision of Oakland.

A place where culture has just been embraced.

I always wanted to be able to provide music to create spaces where people can feel safe with all different walks of life, and you can be who you are and come together.

When I started my band, Kev Choice Ensemble, my first main goal was really to showcase a band of young, African American musicians, who can play music at a high level and a high caliber.

Even the image of that is a powerful thing, especially when you have so many negative images of what our men and women are doing.

♪ They call the police on us ♪ ♪ We was just playin' our music ♪ ♪ They trying to force my people out ♪ ♪ Man that's all that BS ♪ ♪ Rent going up, can't even afford it ♪ ♪ Speaking on this microphone, ♪ my soul good it's cordless ♪ Especially as an African American male, it was important for me to try to be an example for kids here in Oakland, who have a desire and you can see that they have the potential to do great things.

Hip-hop culture, when I was a young kid in Oakland, we were engulfed in that.

When I went to junior high school, I remember seeing the ninth-graders around the trash can, beating on the trash can, having a cipher; blown away that kids would just be rapping for like an hour straight.

♪ Like Chemistry have them combined ♪ ♪ In these notes in these words ♪ ♪ Like atoms to make energy ♪ ♪ Ha ha yeah ♪ At that time Oakland was a majority African American city.

Very successful doctors, lawyers, activists, more Black teachers.

So it was very much a place where Black people can do well and could thrive.

My mother was a single mother of two children, but she was able to afford to live here, to pay her rent.

That's almost impossible nowadays.

With the decline of the African American population, we don't have that same sense of community that we used to have, because people have been forced out, or people can't afford it, or people are being made uncomfortable.

♪ Sound familiar since ♪ the days of the frontier ♪ ♪ Politics been corrupt, ♪ takeovers, displacement ♪ ♪ Colonizers, gentrification.

♪ ♪ Similar situations that we facing ♪ ♪ You don't know your history ♪ ♪ Then you're doomed to repeat it ♪ ♪ We're talkin' bout rooted in Oakland ♪ ♪ Where our roots run deep... ♪ For years, I kept my world of hip-hop, my world of being a classical pianist and my world of jazz very, very separate.

Being able to do Soul Restoration Suite, taking the hip-hop concept, creating it with a full orchestra -- I feel like it's something that's been in my mind for a long time.

♪ I just wanna free my soul ♪ ♪ My soul ♪ ♪ I just wanna be your soul... ♪ That word, restoration, trying to get back to who I really am as a person.

To what got me into music.

And that desire to get better, to grow, and also at the same time, thinking about how do we get back to what Oakland really is.

That community of support, of pride.

I know things change, I know times change; different people come in, but we still have to respect the traditions.

Understanding the culture, the people, and knowing those are the people that Oakland has always embraced and stood for.

♪ I know one day we gonna make it ♪ ♪ I know one day... ♪ ♪ My soul has no limitations ♪ ♪ My life is priceless ♪ ♪ My faith is endless ♪ ♪ And I believe in truth ♪