22-year-old Will Perkins, a native of Riverbank, California has been playing the piano for 11 years and performing at Ragtime/Jazz Festivals since the age of 14. Recently returned from a two-year hiatus as a missionary in Uruguay, he is excited to make his first public performances at the 2015 West Coast Ragtime Festival. His love for the traditional stride piano styles of Fats Waller, James P. Johnson and Dick Wellstood have lead him to opportunities to perform at ragtime festivals around the United States , and in 2012, Will was a featured performer at the Bohem Ragtime and Early Jazz Festival Budapest, Hungary. Later on that same year, he placed 3rd in the World Championship of Old-Time Piano in Peoria, Illinois. More recently, he was awarded a scholarship to study Jazz at Brigham Young University – Idaho in Rexburg, Idaho, where he currently resides and attends school.