“If you find these composers in history, you’ll understand Mozart and Beethoven were improvisers, and classical music wasn’t as buttoned up and as classist as it is now. Even back then, it wasn’t called classical music. If that’s classical, why isn’t American or Black music, diasporic music, considered classical as well? They mark the final volumes in the Batiste Piano Series. “I really believe that numbers and dates carry meaning, and I really do believe in the alignment of intention.”