During Mr. Hernandez’s 2nd period class on Wednesday a special musical guest was introduced to the classroom. Barry Kaufman a mandolinist has performed from LA to the San Fransico bay area he was  very ecstatic to share the history of the mandolin with the class he talked about the origin of this beautiful instrument. Barry performed old Italian folk songs and sea shanties even a killer Led Zeppelin riff and the Beatles all on the mandolin. The class was very invested in his performance and even asked if he could play guitar to which he gladly obliged as Mr. Hernadez handed him a guitar.

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after talking a little about the history of the mandolin he's ready to play

after his performance I was able to get an interveiw with The Strolling Mandolinist lats see what he has to say:

” So what made you want to play the mandolin?”

“Well, my mom and dad had a guitar in the house when I was growing up and naturally my parents asked me if I wanted to play any other instrument and I said surprise me, and one day I came ho home, my dad had bought a mandolin at a garage sale for $15 dollars and I’ve liked it ever since”

‘How long have you been playing the mandolin professionally”

‘Before I started playing professionally I worked at an electronics store and only played in my spare time, then in about the mid 80’s I decided to quit my job to pay professionally, my income went down, but you know what? My satisfaction went up”

“Where are some places you’ve played at?/where do you like to play at the most?”

“I definitely like playing outdoors and at festivals, actually my next performance is at Morro Bay”

‘”How did you and Mr. Hernandez meet?”

“We met at the Open Streets Santa Maria event he was with his jazz choir and was having some sound issues I was able to talk to him and he told me about performing for one of his classes in the future so here I am!”

Check out Barry Kaufman’s performances down below