Ronnie Aaron Lewis

Beloved brother, Mr. Ronnie Aaron Lewis, nee Aaron, of Carson NM passed away on October 12, 2018 at the age of 66 following a short battle with cancer. Aaron was born to parents Dr. Albert J. Lewis and Sophia Lewis on March 26, 1952 in Haifa Israel. His given middle name of Allen was legally changed to Aaron, which is how he liked to be called. His family moved back to the United States in 1956, to Los Angeles, CA where Aaron attended Elysian Heights Elementary, Thomas Starr King Jr. High and John Marshall High School. He was the second of four children and the eldest son. Aaron attended LACC in Los Angeles, studying only music as he wanted to pursue a career as a professional musician. He later attended Cal State Dominquez Hills and received his BA in Music. During the time he was attending Dominquez Hills, he performed with many orchestras including the Santa Monica Chamber Orchestra and the Los Angeles Baroque Orchestra and did so for 15 years. During that time, he became a music teacher in the Los Angeles Public School System. He also pursued his love of Jazz music and played in various bands and the continued orchestras, playing throughout the world at venues such as the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, the Getty Museum, Hollywood Bowl, the Brighton Music Festival in England and many music festivals in Holland and Germany. After 5 years of teaching, the bureaucracy of the school system became intolerable and Aaron fell back on his extensive wood working and construction skills learned as the maintenance man for his Mothers rental properties and the remodel of his personal home. He became a licensed general contractor in CA, working on mostly commercial jobs with a few residential jobs tossed in. In 1992, he moved to Carson, NM to build Earthships and other passive solar designed homes. Always experimenting with alternative materials, he found his niche building passive solar straw bale and Eco block houses. In the meantime, he also remodeled a number of houses around Taos and Taos County. He also played in numerous local bands, All One Jones, Sageberry Jam, his own Swing Daddies, Los Otros, collaboration with Don Richmond called Taosamosa and many other duets and eventually as a solo artist. He also played with the Taos Chamber Music Group, Taos Community Orchestra and for 7 years was the first chair tenor sax player for the renowned Santa Fe Great Big Jazz Band. He also taught private music lessons in Los Alamos until the beginning of 2018, also helping out with the middle and high school music programs. Aaron never married and had no children. He is survived by his older sister, Mynka Lewis, youngest brother Ted Lewis, both of Los Angeles, CA and his younger brother Brian Lewis and sister in law Yvonne Lewis of Ranchos de Taos, NM, along with nieces and nephews and numerous cousins. He is also survived by half nephews Tristram Farrow of Boston, MA, Anthony Vasquez of Colorado Springs, CO and half niece Angelique Farrow of Crestone, CO. A Celebration of Life Ceremony is in the planning stages and will be held in the Spring of 2019. Notifications will be forthcoming. One last statement from Aaron’s own lips about his music career, “Ultimately you have to go all the way or you never know if it is going to work and I’ve always hedged my bets by building, it may be time to change that!” Sadly he never got that chance.