Deceased January 30, 2022
View alumni profile (log in required)
Read obituary
In Memory
Jeffrey Tripp passed away on Jan. 30 from a cerebral hemorrhage, the “Damoclean sword” he would say he lived under, which followed a heart valve replacement in 2008.
Jeff grew up in Philadelphia, graduated from Penn Charter in 1961 and was a member of our class of 1965, despite leaving for good in fall 1964 on his motorcycle, just months shy of graduation.
His nomadic professional career was highlighted by his involvement in music, which began with designing guitar bridges popular on the colorful ’70s music scene. He then moved with the times into the world of digital sound, designing sound modulation tools still in circulation today, including the Tripp Strip ribbon controller, Kurzweil MIDIBoard and NoteBender.
Jeff was a talented guy who could fix appliances, engines and musical instruments. The breadth of his general knowledge was at times almost shocking, even if his discourse on subjects of all kinds was, well, infamous. He could not talk about a young Tom Brady without saying “triangulate.” He would simply assume in conversation that you had read The Playboy of the Western World.
His proudest accomplishment was raising his two boys, fervently engaged with their lives and academic/athletic development.
He lived in a great many places before moving to the North Shore of Massachusetts in March 1980, but after taking up residence there, his adoption was complete and devotional until what proved a final chapter by Pleasant Pond in Wenham.
He is survived by his two sons; Noel’s wife, Liza, and their girls, Lorelei, Ariel and Matilda; Lyle’s wife, Hazel, and their children, Sienna, Walter and Briar Rose; and his niece, Abigail, her husband, Frank Talarico, and their boys Tripp, Abe and Clive. We carry with us his love of basketball, Van Morrison and the vagaries of the English language.
—Paul Ehrmann ’65