Ron Nossaman was a good friend, and I will miss him terribly. I knew him for some 36 years, although it has been almost 30 years now since we lived in the same town.
When I joined The Piano Technicians Guild, Ron was there, having started in the business four years or so before I did. When I was ready to take the RPT exams, it was Ron who gave me the written exam, it was Ron who gave me the tech exam. I was a bundle of nerves; Ron exuded calm.
My family has their own memories of Ron. My eldest child has vivid memories of visiting Ron’s house and finding an injured ‘possum inhabiting the Nossaman family bathtub.
After we moved to a new town, my wife found that she very much enjoyed reading the newsletter from the old chapter; it was written by Ron, and my wife regularly read it because she simply enjoyed reading Ron’s writing. At one point she discovered that she wasn’t getting to read every issue, and contacted Ron to let him know. He got back with me, saying, “You haven’t been sharing”, and after that sent my wife her own copy of his chapter newsletter.
After all, Ron did have a way with words. His way of congratulating me upon my receiving PTG's Golden Hammer was to say, "I heard you got hammered -- good job," taking obvious delight in the double meaning.
By the time I moved away, it was obvious that Ron was worthy of participating in discussions of piano technology at the national level, and I told the old chapter just that. Now, decades later, the value of Ron’s contributions are abundantly clear and will continue to be so as long as the archives of Pianotech and CAUT continue to exist. Others have described Ron’s nature and his continued pleas for real knowledge based on real experiments. He posted such a plea in the early morning of the day he died; in other words, Ron continued to be Ron until the very day he died. I would not have had it any other way.
Ron provided rebuilds (all complete with soundboards, bridges, pinblocks, plate modification, rescaling, etc.) for me on four Steinways — an M, 2 B’s, and a D. All of the pianos are successful, and will likely continue to serve their intended purposes for years and years to come. The pianos differ substantially from their Steinway roots, with different strengths and weakness than the originals. As is well known, Ron was unafraid of being different, and his rebuilds reflect that.
Ron once remarked that that his dad was the smartest person he, Ron, had ever met. This got me to thinking, if I myself ever met any person smarter than Ron Nossaman, I haven’t a clue who that person might have been. Ron was brilliant; I used to describe him as a technical wizard, for his ability to imagine spatial relationships and manipulate the materials associated with piano technology.
Ron was coming over to my house once, and I set out a puzzle for him to try his hand at. I had failed to work the puzzle, even though I understood exactly how the puzzle was configured, I could not get the puzzle pieces to actually move. Ron took one look, asked permission to manipulate the puzzle in a way that could possibly damage it, got down on the floor and solved the puzzle almost immediately. I should have know that is what would happen.
Ron’s death appears to have greatly affected those that knew him. People are telling me they have been surprised at how deeply moved they have been upon hearing of Ron’s death.
I don’t intend to say good-bye to Ron. He will be a part of my life as long as I live. I happened to tune one of Ron’s pianos on the day he died, and I will joyfully work on Ron’s pianos as long as I continue to work on any pianos at all.
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Kent Swafford
Lenexa KS
913-631-8227
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