He was a brilliant and seemingly down to earth sincere person who loved music and good sound.
I exchanged emails with JS on several buying occasions and met him only once at Capital Audiofest a few years back. He was also technically my boss for a couple of years, though I never had any direct interaction, back in the late seventies when he started and ran the Tech Hifi chain and I worked at one part time during college in NJ. That was also my first exposure to Ohm Speakers, where I sold many pair of Ohm Es, Ls, C2s and Hs. It was teh house line but I also found them to beat all teh competition for overall sound and value. At Tech Hifi one would also find Advent, AR, KLH EV, JBL, Infinity, CV and other lines most of the popular brands of the day.
He was a leader and innovator, not a follower, firm in his mission to deliver better sound (and support services) for less to as many as possible and he did exactly that for a good 50 years or so. What other speaker company provided parts, upgrades and significant trade-in value for most every speaker it made over 50 years? None I know of.
Ohm itself had the reputation of being a very low overhead, blue collar shop. JS himself seemed to reflect that when I met him.
At the Capital audiofest, it struck me how JS took pride in setting up and competing in the most acoustically challenged room at the show, a two level atrium. He was not one to do things conventionally it seemed.....he semed to relish the challenge and the results while not 100% perfect was pretty darn good.
He also seemed like to demonstrate his speaker's sound with modest electronics that many might actually be able to afford. His mission was to deliver the best sound to more for less and he did. His Walsh CLS design is/was one of a kind......very interested to see where it might go now.
His closing remark in communication I observed was always "good listening!"
For sure!
