Ron Storer was a dedicated and devout minister of music beloved by the church choristers he led. He was a mentor who touched young people’s lives. He was a craftsman who built sets for his church music productions and remodeled metro area homes in partnership with his designer wife.
He also constructed model planes — impressively large, radio-controlled craft that he “piloted” in model air show competitions.
Ronald D. Storer, 63, died Tuesday at his Dacula home of a heart attack. His life will be celebrated in a 3 p.m. service Sunday at Wages and Sons Gwinnett Chapel in Lawrenceville.
Born in Ohio, Storer came to Atlanta in 1980 with a degree in music from Trevecca Nazarene University in Nashville, Tenn., and embarked on a 25-year church music career.
He led choirs at four churches — Atlanta First Nazarene in Stone Mountain, Lilburn First Baptist, Atkinson Road Baptist and Daybreak Community Church, both in Lawrenceville. From 1980 to 1995, he also led the Atlanta Christian Chorus, which rehearsed weekly at the First Baptist Church of Atlanta and gave 10 concerts a year at local churches.
One of his longtime choir members, Linda Barnhill of Braselton, said Storer had a gentle manner as a conductor.
“Ron felt the music intensely and communicated to us how the composer wanted his music performed,” she said. “He had so much talent and yet was so humble.”
Another chorister, Suzy Stevenson of Bethlehem, said Storer’s singing voice was smooth as velvet. “Ron sounded like Kenny Rogers, and he even looked a lot like him. Ron made the songs he sang come alive, whatever their genre.”
Storer also constructed sets for his choirs’ performances. “They looked so professional that you could put them on stage at Atlanta’s Civic Center,” Stevenson said.
Jason Harper was a singer who was profoundly influenced by Storer.
“I was 11 when Ron encouraged me to take voice lessons,” Harper said. “He made music fun for me at a time when I was consumed with sports. So when I went to college (Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn.), I majored in music.”
Harper said after college he worked two years at Opryland as a performer, then settled in Little Rock, Ark., moving initially into radio and then to television news. He said he continues to sing and act in local theater productions, for which he credits Storer’s mentoring. “Ron was like a second father to me,” he said.
In 1998 Storer left his music career to work full time with his wife, Rhonda, in Storer Classic Designs Inc., remodeling dozens of homes, mostly in the northeast suburbs.
Todd Harrison of Monroe was one of Storer’s numerous satisfied clients. “Ron was a jack-of-all-trades; only in his case he mastered them all,” Harrison said. “He redid just about everything in our house over a four-year period and did it well. He became a part of our family, someone in whom we placed complete trust.”
One of Storer’s favorite leisure pastimes was building model planes. “Ron started small, but eventually his planes got bigger and bigger — with 6- and 7-foot wingspans — to the point they took over our four-car garage,” his wife said.
Survivors in addition to his wife include his mother, Martha Storer of Xenia, Ohio; two sons, Andrew Leblanc and Breland Leblanc of Leland, Mich.; a stepdaughter, Corie Weathers of Savannah; a stepson, Shane Lewis of Flowery Branch; a sister, Joy Bradley, also of Xenia; a brother, Steve Ehrlinger of Irving, Texas; and three grandchildren.
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