I received this email from John's son.

Bob Taylor

  Dear friends, relatives and mechanical music fellow enthusiasts
  of John Phillips,  This is Chris Phillips, John's son.

  I am afraid to inform you John passed away on Monday.  Since a week
  after his 80th birthday at the beginning of October he has been very
  sick with his heart not working properly and he has been essentially
  bedridden.  As many of you will know he had a major heart attack 12
  years ago.  The damage to his heart from that finally caught up with
  him.  He collapsed at home on Monday and the ambulance service
  (paramedics) could not revive him.

  My mother will not be regularly (if at all) reading John's email;
  her email address is berylephillips@outlook.com.geentroep [delete
  ".geentroep" to reply].  Mine is Chris.Phillips@csiro.au.geentroep

  Sorry for the impersonal approach of sending a bulk email.  I was not
  sure how to get contact details for many of you.  If you hardly knew
  my father, please feel free to ignore this email -- there will be no
  offence taken by lack of reply.

Regards,

Bob Taylor
Missouri