Grace Almanza

With our school holding many hidden gems, one of them may be walking around with an instrument in their hand. John Poupore, a senior who is known for walking around with his acoustic guitar and is always playing a tune. He believes he’s just the average joe with an everyday life, but he’s much more interesting than any average person.

Poupore started learning to play guitar through classes, when he believed he needed a place to run away to when there was something wrong going on in life. Realizing that he had a true passion for playing the guitar, after only a year of practices, he decided to start teaching himself. He believed if he pushed himself to learn even more that he would go even further. Ever since then, Poupore has been picking away on the guitar with more advanced techniques than one can learn by themself in only seven years.

Poupore looks up to a deceased guitarist known as Dimebag Darrell who passed during an attempted assassination in 2004. His favorite genre of music is heavy metal while his favorite band is Pantera. Poupore already has a band of his own known as Vitabellum, and even a second band that is in the works at the moment which has no name yet. Wishing to make a career of what he does, he hopes both bands can gain a strong fan base and hopefully a future in media.

When asked about John, or “guitar guy”, many teachers and students only had positive things to say.

“He’s always walking around his guitar playing away strumming away,” said Mr.Timpone, “by first sight you can tell he has a passion and I’m pretty sure any bystander can see that … At least he doesn’t play in class.”

Along with the fact that he plays his acoustic around school, Poupore still practices at least two to three hours every day. It is clear that John Poupore is someone who holds a passion for what he does.

As far as advice he has to those who are wishing to push as far as him, Poupore said,

“You just have to keep pushing, have self-dedication,” said Poupore, “Go for that goal no matter what, just make it your life.”

With the dedication and love John Poupore holds for music and the amount of time he puts into his work, it is obvious that he will he make it further than he ever imagined.