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Valerie Vaccaro

Valerie Vaccaro is a jazz journalist since 1995 and has written for Jazz Now Magazine, JazzUSA.com, JazzReview.com, JazzHouse.org, SmoothJazzNow.com, SmoothVibes.com, SmoothJazzVibes.com and is a proud contributor to AllAboutJazz.com.

About Me

Valerie Vaccaro has been an amateur musician since the age of five (piano, clarinet, flute, alto and soprano saxophones). Valerie is a writer for over 50+ years (poet, lyricist, essayist, music journalist, jazz journalist, academic journal article author, book chapter author, and more). Most of Valerie’s life has been spent pursuing academic excellence, working in marketing and teaching marketing as a professor, but her love of music as a listener, amateur musician, and writer has weaved its way throughout her life journey. Music has always been close to her heart and soul. In the 1980s, Valerie was a pop music and entertainment journalist in the NYC and Long Island area for various local publications including Good Times Magazine and On Campus Magazine. Valerie was also a radio deejay at WBMB Baruch College radio station where she played a wide range of music including jazz, R&B, soul, pop and rock music. At WBMB, Valerie became Promotion Director and was Founder, Editor-in-Chief and writer for the WBMB MusicBox radio station newsletter. Valerie also was a member of the Songwriters Guild of America where she took songwriting classes and attended events. Valerie also wrote press releases for some Five Towns College music events. For about ten years, while also earning a BBA degree in Marketing and an MBA in Advertising, Valerie worked in the NYC area in advertising, market research, sales promotion, public relations and in the music industry for RCA Records. Since 1988, Valerie career path has been in higher education as a marketing professor. Her academic publications have focused on music atmospherics in retail and service environments, diffusion of innovation, and social entrepreneurship. In 2017, Valerie wrote a book chapter “A Consumer Behavior-Influenced Multidisciplinary Transcendent Model of Motivation for Music Making” which was published in the Oxford Handbook of Music-Making and Leisure (editors Roger Mantie and Gareth Dylan Smith). Since 2014, when Valerie learned about Toms.com and WarbyParker.com, she has become a social enterprise enthusiast and has included over 30 nonprofit organizations and for-profit social enterprises in marketing class projects for over 1600 students. Back in 1995, while pursuing a Ph.D. in Marketing and teaching marketing as an Adjunct Instructor, Valerie Vaccaro began her path as a jazz journalist writing for a local newspaper in the New York City area. Her first jazz review was on a show at The Blue Note – New York with Larry Carlton and Kirk Whalum. In the past 30 years, Valerie has attended countless shows at jazz venues including the Blue Note – New York, the Beacon Theater, Village Vanguard, Iridium, Birdland, Smoke Jazz & Supper Club, Sounds of Brazil, the IMAC theatre, Berks Jazz Fest, Mt. Hood Jazz Festival, Stanford Jazz Festival, Yoshi’s - Oakland, Umbria Jazz Festival in Perugia and Orvieto, and many others. Since 1996, Valerie Vaccaro (aka Val Vaccaro) has been a contributing writer of feature articles, album reviews, concert reviews, event previews, etc. for various jazz publications including Jazz Now Magazine, Jazzhouse.org, JazzUSA.com, JazzReview.com, SmoothJazzNow.com, Roots Music Report, SmoothVibes.com, and now as a proud contributor for AllAboutJazz.com. Valerie is also a member of the Jazz Journalists Association. Valerie lives with her husband Barry who is a jazz and blues music aficionado and a very talented photographer in New Jersey.

My Jazz Story

My Favorite Local Jazz Venues & Festivals

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