If it’s a weeknight in Vineyard Haven then the strains of B.B. King or Howlin’ Wolf are likely spilling from the third story of an unassuming white house on Church street. There the Mourning Sons are crammed into the attic, mired in a tangle of extension cords and lit only by a bare lightbulb and that most uncompromising American form of music, the blues.

“We play until [drummer Zion Harris’] mom tells us to shut up,” says frontman and bassist Evan Hall.

In the fall Evan is leaving the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School for the Berklee College of Music in Boston where he says he hopes to study jazz composition. This week he learned that his education there would be funded in full by a prestigious Gates Millennium Scholarship from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

“My family was pumped,” he said. “We’re all celebrating.”

Music has always played a central part in Evan’s life. A year ago the Gazette profiled his role as an entrepreneurial hip-hop dance instructor. In 2009 he led a group of fellow Vineyard dancers to victory in a national dance competition in Times Square, where judges recognized the fruits of five years training with the Kelly Peters dance crew. Mr. Hall has given up the homegrown dance school, but the passion remains.

“I dance on my own time but it became too much of a job — something I had to do rather than something I wanted to do,” he said. “In Boston there were a lot of dance battles and that’s what I miss the most. There’s no better feeling than roasting someone in a dance battle, and there’s nothing like getting roasted to make you work harder.”

“Every so often if a funky song comes on I’ll still move a little,” he added.

Seeking another challenge, he set up a music studio in his basement where he tackled the production side of music-making. In his newfound role as singer and bassist Evan cites as influences Robert Johnson, Jimi Hendrix, Wes Montgomery, Django Reinhardt, Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters, Sonny Boy Williamson, Little Walter, Mos Def, Bob Marley and Peter Tosh before pausing to apologize to rock Valhalla for any omissions. He says that while reggae, hip-hop, jazz and even ragtime inspire the band, blues is the biggest influence on the Mourning Sons, a style of music Evan was turned on to by band guitarist Jake Bilzerian.

“My stepdad used to play me old Motown — Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, and every so often a blues song would come on here or there so I could dig that stuff,” he said. “But now it’s turned from something I could dig to a straight-up obsession.”

Evan says he can’t fully explain the timeless draw of the music.

“It’s just real music,” he said. “It’s not syndicated or replicated or fabricated.”

His enthusiasm for the music sadly does not extend far outside the fraternity of old souls that make up Mourning Sons.

“I try to play it for my high school but very few people can really dig it, it’s kind of sad,” he said before estimating: “I would say under 10 kids dig it.”

In winning the scholarship Evan admits that procrastination in the rigorous eight-essay process played its part, but when he finally put his pen to the paper he held nothing back.

“It sounds a little cheesy but I just tried to straight up come from my soul,” he said. “It was almost like a psychiatric procedure because it was stuff that I had inside that I hadn’t laid out on the table.”

Reflecting on the scholarship, which is awarded to 1,000 minority students a year, he is somewhat at a loss.

“I got really, really lucky, you know what I mean?” he said. “I guess my words just resounded with them.”

Now that he has established his musical and dancing roots on the Island, Evan says he feels he is ready for a bigger stage.

“I can’t wait to get off the rock for one thing,” he said. “I’ve been working towards this for four years. Now the stones are just laid out in front of me and I just have to step on them.”