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Our friend Al Sekela has passed away.

Al Sekela passed away suddently last night. The details of his death are not important; the details of his life are.

Most of you would know Al for his sage advice and generosity to the rest of us as an AA inmate. Al cared deeply for his music, and just as deeply for sharing the fun of discovery in tinkering with his equipment. You could always count on Al's extensive theoretical background; yet he never quibbled with results, just the same, even if they made no sense in theory. He could have argued with the best of you as an EE. Instead he listened - to what you were doing and to what worked for musical enjoyment.

He certainly increased the musical enjoyment for many of us, not the least of which was mine!

I have had the pleasure and the privilege to know Al personally in the real world. Though we met through AA, we carried on a friendly partnership in person exploring new tweaks, sharing New York style pizza with anchovies, wine tasting, hunting through parts bins in surplus stores, and flipping through stacks of used CDs to find that jazz or classical musical gem you cannot find in todays stores. Our visits were the highlights of many of my holidays. Al would show me his latest experiments and would check out mine. Then we'd listen to his fabulous system, and believe me this was one helluva system he'd cooked up and customized.

Al knew a lot of you as manufacturers and inventors. Only makes sense, as he was a talented and successful EE and chip designer. I want to ensure you that he took any secrets you shared with him to his grave; he had unshakable respect for intellectual property entrusted to him.

I'll never forget the time he took me to the cavernous wine warehouse to demo Rick Beveridge's restored speakers. Unbelievable experience. All Al wanted to do then was to help Rick achieve his dream of restoring his father's fabulous creations.

His wife, Carolyn, says he wanted no fuss. "Just remember him as the kind gentleman he was, that was taken away too soon."

The remembering part will be easy; the loss will not.



Edits: 03/05/11 03/05/11
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Topic - Our friend Al Sekela has passed away. - bartc 06:01:54 03/05/11 (91)
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