Rebecca Apodaca led a most exciting and prominent life.

She grew up in Orange County when there were real orange groves still around that she and her brothers would play in. She attended Tustin High School and moved up to Santa Cruz, graduating from Cabrillo College with a degree in music.

Rebecca worked every job imaginable from florist to dog groomer to census worker. However she found her niche working on musical instruments by attending Orange Coast College and made her way in LAUSD by becoming a female repair technician in a male-dominated profession. She worked in several music stores before establishing A & D Music, Inc. with her husband in 1976. She was the "A" in A & D Music.

Yet, she became a single mother in 1984 and pushed to create a home based business that catered to thousands of students in the Orange County area by providing rentals, repairs and sales of musical instruments. She enjoyed working with children and would often go out to schools to educate students about musical instruments. She found pleasure in restoring instruments and came to be known as the "Godmother of Guitars".

She switched over to musical instrument appraisals in which she went back to college in her 50s at UC Irvine where she became a USPAP IRS certified appraiser. She has worked as an expert witness and she is a member of the American Society of Appraisers, the American Musical Instrument Society, the National Association of Professional Band Instrument Technicians (NAPBIRT) and NAMM-the International Association of Music Merchants.

She became a journalist, writing for Music Sound Retailer and Vintage Guitar magazine. She worked with, and curated friendships with, several prominent people of the music industry such as RC Allen, Bernardo Rico of BC Rich, Cindalee Hall of Rickenbacker and various museums such as the Musical Instrument Museum (MIM), the Museum of Making Music, and even the Metropolitan in New York.

She was an artist and became creative in making musical instruments artworks and a writer of cookbooks and songs. One thing she was proud of was being a rapping grandmother who recreated the song "California Love". She spent many weekends playing bass and singing in "The Regulars" group and playing for local and Los Angeles based church groups. She spent time performing in a group called Mariachi for All, in which she performed with Los Camperos, marking an achievement in her life.

She loved Laguna Beach as her home and thrived in her community. Divers Cove was her favorite spot. During the holidays, you might see her dressed up in her Mrs. Santa Claus persona, as she enjoyed seeing the kids' faces. She did volunteer work for Sally's Fund and made contributions to the Susie Q center and the Laguna Beach Assistance League. She was asked several times to MC various functions at Laguna Beach High School and her favorite day in Laguna was Patriot's day parade and the Labor Day Pancake Breakfast. She was nominated for Artist of the Year for Patriot's Day Parade due to the lifetime of the contributing music to the community in elementary and secondary education, instrument repair, rentals, fundraising for music, Nominating the city for 100 best Communities in Music, MC at Blues Jazz Festival and helped to create the Laguna Beach Community Band.

She loved to travel and learn new things. At 65, she was snorkeling in a cenote with her 16 year old grandson in the Yucatan. She often traveled for appraisals working with Oberlin College in Ohio, the Metropolitan in New York, the Museum of Making Music in Arizona, and the Smithsonian in Washington D.C.

She is survived by her daughter, Micaela, her grandson, Renin, and her son-in-law Matthew.