Kara Barnard’ s
Silver Strings
~ story and photos by Ryan Stacy
This batch of Silver Strings( not listed in order): Bev Bonsett, Carole and Erv Schindel, Lynn Hughes, Jenny Austin, Allison O’ Shea, Tony Sosbe, Pat Bolinger, Mary Kilgore, Shirley Todd, and Kara Barnard.
16 Our Brown County • March / April 2019
It’ s a Thursday afternoon in a meeting room at the Brown County YMCA. A group of locals sits in a circle around Kara Barnard, dulcimers and guitars in hand, eager to learn, smiles on their faces. These are just a few of the 80-plus students Kara sees each week in the private and group lessons she offers, but you’ d never know she’ s so busy: her encouraging tone and relaxed demeanor make everyone feel valued, engaged, and welcomed as a unique maker of music.
According to Kara, part of her success is about her passion for music and a lifetime of teaching. From giving younger players lessons in high school to her years as a full-time guitar instructor, she’ s had lots of time to perfect her approach to music instruction.“ In my twenties, Kevin Franklin at Guitar Works in Greenwood really pushed me to take up teaching,” Kara says.“ I had 60 students a week there, teaching guitar, banjo, dulcimer. I did that for about ten years, and it really taught me how to tap into how different people learn, and how to help them identify and overcome the obstacles in their playing.” Years after going solo with her teaching in Brown County, Kara still relies on a few key strategies: stay positive, believe in every student’ s ability to learn, and share in their joy in mastering a difficult lesson.
But teaching people music goes much deeper than songs and instruments for Kara— it’ s truly a transcendent experience.“ Music is about vibration, and that vibration connects us to everything in nature,” she explains.“ Anybody who claims not to feel that rhythm has never studied the wag of a dog’ s tail, or the sound of a cat scratching, or the metronome of