Salvatore Ronci

Salvatore “Sal” Ronci, a musician and educator beloved to family, friends, students, and audiences in the Miami and Daytona Beach areas, died November 9, 2020 of complications from COVID-19 and Parkinson’s Disease. He was 83.

Born Salvatore Ronciglione in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, January 19, 1937, to Italian immigrant Giuseppe Ronciglione (Joseph Ronci) and first-generation Italian-American Rose Aveni. Infant Sal moved with his family to New Haven, Connecticut, after his family home burned in a fire. He attended Ezekiel Cheever Grammar School and Wilbur Cross High School, where he discovered a gift and love for music, later studying trumpet with Boston Symphony Orchestra great, Armando Ghitalla while attending the prestigious Hartt School of Music in Hartford, Connecticut.

His family moved to Florida in 1956, Sal transferring to the University of Miami in Coral Gables where he performed, arranged, recorded, and toured with The Coralairs, a five-man vocal group primarily of fellow UM students. The group enjoyed a local top-10 hit with “A Lover is A Fool,” introduced the now-classic Christmas song “Buona Natale” to a national audience, and headlined Havana’s Sans Souci nightclub on the eve of the Cuban revolution before disbanding in 1959. Sal later returned to UM to complete bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music education.

While at UM, Sal met Judith “Judy” Cantor. The two married in 1958, settled in Miami, reared three children, and launched successful careers as public-school teachers, Sal continuing to book gigs as a trumpet and electric-bass player, singer, and band leader. As a licensed realtor he worked hard to help secure a comfortable retirement for himself and Judy. After 30 years as one the Miami-Dade school district’s top music teachers (with notable stints at Kinloch Park Jr. High, Palmetto Sr. High, and Glades Middle, among other schools), Sal retired with Judy to Ormond Beach, Florida, where his parents and sisters lived and where he launched a successful second act as leader of the Sal Ronci Big Band, known for its popular series of performances at the Daytona Beach Bandshell. Sal was especially proud to share his love of jazz through “The Story of Jazz,” a live in-school education program he created and presented for students of Volusia County Public Schools.

In addition to Judy, his wife of 62 years, Sal’s survivors include daughter Julie Sipes (Ken) and son Michael Ronci of Ormond Beach and son Jeff Ronci (Juan Bosco Talavera) of Miami; sisters Loretta Tuttle Santiago (Efrain) of Edgewater, Florida, and Marie Richardson (Ross) of Daytona Beach; Uncle Carlyle Aveni of New Haven, Connecticut; Aunt Anna Ronciglione Durkin of Philadelphia; nearly two dozen nieces and nephews; loving cousins; friends and fellow musicians; and countless students and audiences he inspired and entertained through the years.

Services are postponed until the novel coronavirus pandemic is under control. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to the Halifax Humane Society of Volusia County or a charity of your choice.