OAKLAND — If you’re not already a fan of classical music, 15-year-old cellist Nick Reeves, a sophomore at Oakland Tech, might change that.

At the moment, though, he’s busy catching up on schoolwork now that he’s back from Washington, D.C., where he and some even younger colleagues rocked the White House recently as they concluded the National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Awards ceremony.

As the Perfect Fourth quartet with three other boys, Nick got a standing ovation and a hug from the first lady after playing an almost-9-minute excerpt of composer Felix Mendelssohn’s String Quartet no. 6.

“Wow!” Michelle Obama exclaimed as she stepped to the stage after the audience had finally calmed down. “That was amazing. Amazing!

“You guys were phenomenal. And you’re very cute, too!”

Here's something AMAZING. It's one of our students performing at The White House. His name is Nicolas Reeves, and… https://t.co/l0LqtfKLCq — Oakland Schools (@OUSDNews) November 22, 2016

The quartet was in the White House to represent the Detroit-based Sphinx Organization, one of 12 groups honored at the Nov. 15 event. Nick and the other boys met at a summer music performance program Sphinx organized.

“This is why we do what we do,” Obama said in recognizing the work of the organizations that had come in for that day’s honors, which included a $10,000 grant.

“Because if anybody were to walk past these kids on the street, they would make assumptions about what they could do and who they could be. We do it all the time,” she said.

“There are millions of kids in this country who don’t have the resources to become everything that they can be. And shame on us if we don’t do this better,” Obama said.

Nick’s cohorts in the Perfect Fourth hailed from across the country: violinist Aidan Sinclair Daniels, 13, of Chicago; viola player Peirce Ellis, 13, from Philadelphia; and violinist Maxwell Fairman, 12, of Cincinnati.

One of the driving forces in Nick’s applying to Sphinx’s two-week summer academy was the family’s efforts to support his love of classical music, said his father, pharmacist Geoffrey Reeves.

“He felt alone, being one of the only kids of color,” he said.

Nick showed an affinity for music from an early age, his parents said, initially at the Black Pine Circle Day School in Berkeley, a private school he attended for first and second grades, where he first encountered violins and cellos.

“I liked the cello better,” he said.

He was already growing up surrounded by music. “We listen to a lot,” said his mother, Brenda Reeves. And Geoffrey Reeves is a hobbyist musician whose older son plays drums.

The family has frequented chamber music concerts by Oakland, San Francisco and UC-Berkeley orchestras and the California symphony, and attended many concerts at San Francisco Conservatory. Also, they listen to jazz at Yoshi’s and the S.F. Jazz Center and other venues, his mother said.

“There’s nothing like live music and real instruments,” she said. “There’s something so special about learning to express yourself that way.”

This year, Nick joined the Oakland Symphony’s Youth Orchestra.

“The thing that stands out to me is the level of energy he puts into the music. He’s extremely committed, pouring every ounce of everything he’s got into every note,” said Omid Zoufonoun, orchestra conductor.

That intensity is plainly visible on the video of his White House performance, which can be seen online as part of the awards program. The Perfect Fourth step onstage at about 48 minutes in.

At the Sphinx program at Chicago’s Roosevelt University this summer, about 50 to 60 kids were teamed up with like-minded musicians, given master classes by professionals such as the Catalyst Quartet and violinist Rachel Barton Pine.

On a field trip to the Bein and Fushi music store, Nick said, “I got to play an $8 million instrument,” a Stradivarius cello normally kept in a vault there.

That brief experience, with a diamond-encrusted bow, he said, “was really great.”

Nick can rattle off names of musicians he’s inspired by: cellists Gautier Capucon and William Cestari.

He performs in the jazz combo New Language Quintet and the after-school strings club Stringnado. The New Language Quintet has a First Friday gig tonight, playing at the Tip Top bicycle shop on Telegraph to benefit Ride for a Reason, which supports Oakland public schools.

But beyond that, he said, “I’m interested in all kinds of music, stuff that people like in high school.”

“Electric Relaxation” by A Tribe Called Quest is one example. “They’re great,” he said.

Upright bass, which Geoffrey Reeves also plays, is Nick’s second instrument. He coaches other kids on it, too.

“I mainly want to go to music school and play cello in a major symphony. That’s my dream,” Nick said.

The first lady’s advice at the performance? “This is what you have to do: You have to stay in school. You have to. You have to go to college, get your degree, because that is the one things people can’t take away from you, your education. And it is so worth the investment. So stay focused. School and music and the arts is the only thing that matters.”

Contact Mark Hedin at 510-293-2452, 408-759-2132 or mhedin@bayareanewsgroup.com.

New Language Quintet

Performing at the Tip Top Bike Shop, 4800A Telegraph Ave., 6-8 p.m. Friday at a benefit for Ride for a Reason.

Free