After a long three-and-a-half-year battle with pancreatic cancer, John Edward Price, 62, passed peacefully into spirit, with his wife Nancy by his side, on the morning of March 8, 2024, at Zilber Family Hospice in Wauwatosa, WI.

    John was born in Chicago, IL on July 6, 1961, to Ollie Price (Pierson) and Theodore Price, the youngest of 6 children. He developed an interest in music – his lifelong passion – from a young age, and enjoyed spending summers with his aunt, Adeline Washington (Price), and family in Decatur, MI, where he played baseball and daydreamed about monsters and the supernatural. John attended John T. Pirie Elementary School, St. Edmund School, and Mendel Catholic High School in Chicago.

    Despite the offer of an engineering scholarship to Purdue University, John chose to follow his creative dreams, studying music at Berklee College of Music in Boston, and film at Columbia College in Chicago. He completed a BA in Creative Pedagogical Studies at the University of Massachusetts—Amherst.

John was a Waldorf teacher for 21 years. Most of that time was spent as a class teacher and later, teaching high school calculus at Tamarack Waldorf School. He was the first Waldorf teacher in the city of Milwaukee to graduate an 8th grade class. He also taught Science and Math to teachers in the Great Lakes Waldorf Teacher Training. John made a huge impact on the lives of all his students and had a knack for helping them to feel seen. In 2019, he accepted the role of Director of Programing of St. Kate—The Arts Hotel, a job he enjoyed immensely.

    A film connoisseur, actor, teacher, director, author, and songwriter, John was, above all, a superb professional jazz bassist who fervently spread the gospel of music, tirelessly dedicated to keeping the cultural scene of Milwaukee and Southeastern Wisconsin vibrant and alive. He had a wicked sense of humor and could light up a room with his smile. He will be greatly missed by the many people whose lives he touched.

    While in his professional life John was an accomplished renaissance man, his greatest accomplishment was creating an incredible family with his wife of 35 years, Nancy. Married in 1989, the couple raised John’s two children from a previous marriage and together had 3 more. All the children were adored by their parents. The family loved to travel, spent time most summers in Door County, WI and enjoyed occasional trips to the mountains of Estes Park, CO. John shared his love of countless kinds of music with his family and introduced them to all the Jazz greats as well as to artists such as Joni Mitchell, Steely Dan, Earth, Wind and Fire, and Pat Metheny—and so many more. He loved to support his children as they excelled in sports, music, and the arts. His children were his greatest joy.  

    John is survived by his wife, Nancy Kresin-Price; his five children, Carmen Price (Johan Holmquist), Gregory Price, Timothy Price (Kaitlin), Selena Price (Nathanial Jackson), and Sophia Price; his three grandchildren: Theodore Holmquist, Olive Jackson, and Willow Price; his sisters Dianne Brownlee (Willard decd), Helen Ross (Adrian), and Denise Bell (William), sister-in-law Ruth Price, and many nieces, nephews, and countless friends. He is preceded in death by his parents, Theodore & Ollie Price, his brother Theodore Price Jr., sister, Judith Lawson (Dennis), and niece Stephanie Renee Bell.

    John’s Funeral service will be held on Monday, March 11th at 1:00 pm at the Wilson Theater in Vogel Hall at The Marcus Performing Arts Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Refreshments will immediately follow in The Rouge Ballroom at the Pfister Hotel.  

Vogel Hall Address

121 E. State St. Milwaukee, WI 53202

Entrance on the Milwaukee Riverwalk

Pfister Hotel Address

424 E. Wisconsin Ave.

See link below for parking information and directions for The Marcus Center.

https://www.marcuscenter.org/get-tickets/plan-your-visit/parking-directions/ (https://www.marcuscenter.org/get-tickets/plan-your-visit/parking-directions/)