Ronald Muller was born to Doris, and Tony in 1932, and attended an Elementary School in Bakersfield where his proclivity for mallet instruments first appeared, and he gave a solo performance on the xylophone. Shortly thereafter, his parents decided that Southern California held more promise, and the family moved to Los Angeles in 1940, where he finished elementary school in South-Central LA.
Recognizing his burgeoning talent on mallet instruments, his parents put him under the tutelage of Mr. Emil L. Farnlund, a radio and movie studio performer who founded and directed the Marimba Center Studios, where Ron learned to play marimba with four mallets, an advanced and difficult technique, and was also learning the tympani.
In 1945, Ron joined the "Jolly Woodchoppers," a performing group of talented children from the Center who performed on marimbas, pianos, and percussion instruments the swinging arrangements of the famous Earl Hatch, a gifted mallet player who performed on all the radio networks, and was a contract performer for the Paramount Studios.
Together with the "Woodchoppers," he performed a great variety of music in many shows and clubs around LA, soloing on difficult arrangements of compositions such as Rhapsody in Blue. Ron's achievements were not limited to music but also extended into his academic talents when in September he came in first at a regional spelling bee, part of a life-long love of languages.
The next year Ron maintained a steady performance schedule with the Woodchoppers and the Southwest Young People's Symphony, a symphonic group under the baton of Lewis J. D'Ippolito. In March he won a competition at radio station KFI, soloing again on Rhapsody in Blue, this time backed up by an orchestra.
In that same year, Look Magazine wanted to promote new young artists, so they launched a nationwide campaign to see who would make it to the finals in New York City. Ron and the Woodchoppers sliced through the competition and made it to the doors of Carnegie Hall for the final round.
On August the 24th, the winners were announced and the Woodchopers won for "Specialty Group," but for Ron, the results were even more spectacular: After a heart-stopping performance on stage alone, Ron Muller wiped out the competition and was honored as the All American Amateur Marimba Artist, receiving the Red Norvo Trophy and was instantly thrust into the national spotlight.
For the next two years Ron and the now famous group continued to present concerts at a furious pace back in Southern California, including selling out prestigious venues such as the Wilshire Ebell Theater, and Ron had added to his talents by acquiring skills as a concert pianist.
At that time, television was a new phenomenon and provided fresh possibilities for young talent, so Ron had the chance to appear on a television broadcast at KTLA with a trio called "The Tritones," and took first place on an amateur talent show on the CBS network with Don Ameche as master of ceremonies. Throughout that year and the next, Ron continued to perform on tympani with the Southwest Symphony and with his mother as lead viola.
The action continued for the young musicians as they sold-out a concert at the famous Embassy Auditorium in downtown LA, performing a full, two-hour concert. This fantastic musical evening got rave reviews; The San Diego Journal saying that it was "The Most Entertaining Concert of the Season."
1950 saw the graduation of Ron from George Washington High School, and he kept up an active performance schedule with the Inglewood Symphony, and even as a composer, as his composition "Witches Scene From Macbeth," was performed at Washington High.
Ron entered Pepperdine University and for the next two years kept up his frenetic pace, winning awards and accolades for his performances as marimbist, pianist, tympanist, singer, and composer. Ron also made the dean's list and won a scholarship, and was part of a jazz quartet called the "Hot Peppers." He was also involved in the opera program and performed "The Mikado" under the direction of Gaylord Browne.
The years passed and he continued to perform with his old childhood colleagues from the Marimba Center in a quartet called the "Four Tones," and Ron now displayed another new talent, the double bass.
Ron joined the postal service in 1960 and by '64-65 had enrolled in Los Angeles City College where he again made the dean's list due to his academic excellence. In '65, Ron transferred to California State University, Los Angeles, where he played percussion in the College Community Symphony Orchestra. During this time, Ron formed a group that performed Middle Eastern dances called Yallah. On December 20, 1971, Ron was awarded a Bachelor of Arts in Music, and for his recital he brilliantly performed a violin concerto by Paganini on the marimba using the four-mallet technique.
In 1969, Ron made the acquaintance of Richard Unciano, a well-known Eastern European folk dance teacher, author, lecturer, and performer who had a dance company. With the addition of Ron, performance of the music also became possible as Ron possessed prodigious musical skills such as perfect pitch, and the ability to listen to the recordings brought back by Richard’s field work and transcribe the difficult rhythms and melodies note for note. With Richard as dance director, and Ron as music director, a group named Koroyar was formed.
Through the ensuing years, and, in fact, to the end of his life, Ron appeared with Koroyar in hundreds of performances through out the Southern California area and farther afield, such as the Ojai Folk Festival, and in libraries and lecture halls including presentations at LACC, Long Beach State, and other colleges, as an accordionist and on the Bulgarian bag pipe.
During his tenure with Koroyar, Ron participated in another musical project, Terra Nova, contributing his musical prowess on the marimba, the piano, and other keyboards, along with his extensive knowledge of folk music, and his considerable skills in the areas of composition and arranging.
Ron contracted the flu in November of 2018 and due to complications from that disease, passed away peacefully in his sleep at the age of 86 years young.