From the outside, Shepherd Perkins may seem like any other Westminster student in the class of 2025, waking up early for school, partaking in extracurricular activities such as theater productions, working a stable job after school, and caring for his family. However, he has a not-so-common hobby–writing, making, and producing his own music.
Shepherd began his music career at a very young age. He began experimenting with instruments (his first being a ukulele) in fifth grade before discovering the bass. He moved from bass to guitar, and in the last few years has begun the journey of publicizing his talent, but not only on his own.
“I started a band called “Today’s Gravy” with one of my friends back in 2020 or 2021, and we only made four songs, two of which were released. It was my first venture into the release of music, and it was a really fun experience to just mess around and spontaneously make music.”
However, the start to his personal music career was a little shaky. He began with his guitar, GarageBand, and a poor computer microphone before buying a desktop computer and gear for making music. But the technical aspect was not the only advancement from the beginning of his journey.
Once he started really getting into the process of writing and producing music, it wasn’t exactly smooth sailing. It took him another two years before he really got confident enough in his music to start putting it out there. Though even then, there were challenges.
“Between school, my job, helping out with my family, and the theater productions, music kind of sinks to the back. It’s really a question of how much I want it, so if I’m too preoccupied with other things then I’ll never get to it. Another challenge is the psychological aspect, thinking that I’m not good enough, so overcoming the doubt is a big one.”
Even though Perkins is incredibly busy juggling schoolwork, theater, and music, those close to him can tell that he is still an incredible person. One of his close friends, Chase Borage, describes him as “very kind and considerate about every single person, especially me. I love how he checks in on me to make sure I’m doing alright, and he’s a fighter, he always has a positive attitude through everything he’s going through.”
Although there are many challenges to making his own music and balancing his time, Shepherd’s hard work has been paying off. He is in the process of creating and releasing his first album, of which two songs have already been released in the last few months, Alone and Moving Out. Make sure to check him out on Instagram, Spotify, Apple Music, or Youtube.
