Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to José Valentino. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

José, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

To speed up learning processes, I’ve developed and practice a framework called “5 Paths of Consumer Experiences” or “5 Paths of CE.” Implementing this framework within my arts entrepreneurial practices has allowed me to overcome many obstacles that I and other companies who I advise and mentor have confronted. Class is in session!

Whenever I develop a new product or service (i.e., presentation, album production, or performance), I take into consideration that my goal is not only to connect with deemed clientele, but it is also to connect to unknown clientele who empathize with the mission of my product or service. Like many entrepreneurs, I believe it’s important to employ strategic marketing tactics to get the product or service within consumers’ radar. But then what? It becomes out of my control concerning what the clientele thinks about my product or service and immediately enters a gradational curation process that is only natural of human behavior: 1) toleration, 2) judgement, 3) preference, 4) taste, and 5) desire.

First, the clientele will observe the product and see if they can “tolerate it.” If it’s unbearable, they won’t proceed any further. During toleration, the clientele evaluate the product or service and deem it worthy (or not) by comparing it to other products and services that are relatively akin to what is being presented before them, which inevitably continues the path of “judgement.” After judging the product or service, the clientele rank the quality and authenticity of the product or service among other products and services they have experienced to establish a “preference.” For example, if you completed a music performance service, the clientele will compare your performance to another performance and develop their preference between both performers. The next level is “taste” which simply means that the clientele has developed an affinity for the product or service that the entrepreneur provides. Think of this as someone who often eats their top three favorite cultural foods (e.g., Mexican, Italian, and Thai). When your clientele develops a taste for your products and services, you now have obtained loyal costumers (or fans). This is great news!

The last and highest path of consumer-to-product experiences is “desire.” To reach this path, the company (in other words, you!) have to continuously 1) introduce new ideas, 2) innovate new products, and 3) include your community as part of the movement you aspire to create through your mission-based enterprise. These are essential considerations that are applicable within a post-COVID multimodal creative economy. If you ever wonder why certain artists or companies have such appeal and growth, it is largely attributed to them implementing these principles to further influence their consumers’ desire. Hence, the “5 Paths of CE” is a framework I employ within my business models to facilitate a path towards company security, sustainability, leverage, and scalability while also aiming to impact, inspire, develop community, and translate the mission of the company to known and unknown audiences around the world.

José, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

No matter what I do professionally, I always aim to bring 1) efficiency, 2) expediency, and 3) excellence to my joint-ventures within the private sectors of music, television, global outreach & community entrepreneurship, as well as education industries.

My company, JV Music Enterprises, provides seasoned arts entrepreneurs caring and thorough consultations for pursuing best practices in arts entrepreneurial endeavors. We work with our clients to succeed in three areas within their respective business: 1) arts enterprise scalability and leverage; 2) multi-level societal amelioration (i.e. cultural empathy and health awareness); and 3) functionality, sustainability, growth, and impact in Post-COVID multimodal creative economies.

This also coincides with my work as an Editorial Board Member for “Artivate: A Journal of Entrepreneurship in the Arts.” I love helping arts entrepreneurial communities, and thus, I have published suggestions, models, and frameworks in the Journal of Arts Entrepreneurship Education; All About Jazz; International Journal of Community Music; Journal of Popular Music Education; The Conversation; National Association for Music Education; UF News; VoyageTampa; and Kansas Music Review.

Moreover, my love for helping arts educators has compelled me to present research and ideas at the International Society of Music Education; Society of Arts Entrepreneurship Education; Jazz Education Network International Conference; International Jazz and Entrepreneurship Camp; National Association for Music Merchants (NAMM Show – 7x); Global Music Production and Entrepreneurship Summit; National Association for Music Education; CAME Arts Entrepreneurship + Covid Era day; International Guitar Foundations of America Conference; Association of Popular Music Education (x2); University Research Magazine Association Conference; Florida Music Education Association; Texas Music Education Association; The Midwest Clinic; National Flute Association; Florida Statewide Best Practices for Undergraduate Research Symposium; Society of Musicology; and many more conferences.

At the University of Florida College of the Arts, I ardently express my passion for cultivating students’ business & entrepreneurial mindsets, strategies, tactics, effectiveness, and savvy. In 2019, I arrived as the Area Coordinator of Music Business & Entrepreneurship at the UF School of Music where I thoroughly enjoys working with students and colleagues on research and creative activities that promote viability, intercultural empathy, and multimodal functionality as practitioners, teachers, and scholars of arts entrepreneurship. I created, teach, and oversee the following courses that are cross-listed for undergraduate, masters’, and doctoral students and accessible to students all across the university: Strategic Music Entrepreneurship Development; Foundations of Music Business; Multimedia Production for the Music Industry; Social Impact for Music Entrepreneurs; Digital Musicianship and Production; Special Topics: Arts Entrepreneurship Research; and Music Production in Commercial Media. UF allows me to express creative ingenuity as an arts entrepreneur, which has led to bountiful outcomes that impact communities at local and global levels.

To date and within five continents, I have performed 1400+ concerts (i.e., regularly hired as a headliner for commercial, jazz, classical, global music, and Christian worship styles); produced 120+ albums (20 albums as an artist); produced 30 nationally-televised film scores & jingles; keynoted empirical research presentations at 50+ universities; and facilitated 40+ mission trips in partnership with numerous organizations (i.e., Boundless Global, World Relief, among others) in Africa, Europe, Asia, North America, and South America. My artistry and scholarship have been featured nationally and internationally in media outlets such as USA Today, Billboard, Yahoo!, ESPN, PBS, Fox, CBS, ABC, Univision, Telemundo, and NBC, to name a few. Among prestigious performance & production opportunities, I’ve headlined as a Featured Artist at Carnegie Hall and Tanglewood Hall and was a former Music Producer for American Idol and X-Factor.

My joint-ventures include the following roles:

1) Founder, CEO, & Producer at JV Music Enterprises (2006 – Present)
2) Resident Composer/Music Producer at Hayden 5 (2010 – Present)
3) Director of Global Entrepreneurship Initiatives at Diaz Music Institute 501C3 (2017 – Present)
4) Global Ambassador at Worldwind Music UK Co. Ltd. (2010 – Present)
5) Area Coordinator of Music Business & Entrepreneurship at the University of Florida School of Music and Affiliate at the Center for Arts, Migration, and Entrepreneurship. I also served as the former Co-Chair of Business, Entrepreneurship, and Career Planning working group for the UF College of the Arts.

My work as an artist, album producer, composer, audio engineer, marketing director, and entrepreneurial strategist has helped my clients (i.e., artists, record labels, sole-proprietors, academic organizations, and non-music business) and me earn over 100 national and international peer-reviewed awards and publications including two Latin GRAMMY® Award Winning projects, four Latin GRAMMY® Award Nominations, four GLOBAL MUSIC® Awards, one EMMY® Award Win, one GLOBAL GENIUS® Award, one DOVE® Award Nomination, fifty-three Downbeat Student Music® Awards (record holder), one Audio Visual Arts Digital® Award, and 2022 Fast Company’s Top 10 Most Innovative Companies in the World (video), just to name a few. It is always a team effort indeed!

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

My goal is to continue helping arts entrepreneurial practitioners, educators, and companies improve their product’s and service’s impact value as well as their system design’s effectiveness.

My mission is to help clients execute the goal without a spirit of fear but rather with a spirit of love, power, and a sound mind.

All of us have innate abilities and a calling to make use of our talents for a cause that is beyond the natural world. Art is humanity expressed. Hence, art is both natural and spiritual in nature.

My work specifically helps clients actualize their goals in such a way that they inspire their consumers to express the best version of their humanity; a life filled with wonder.

Hence, my company’s expertise is to foster the cultivation of ‘artistry’ during the gradational and inter-cyclical creative stages of 1) exploration, 2) improvisation, 3) documentation, and 4) delivery (EIDD), which are vital and viable stages to express during product and service development, lead generation, self-development, sales, optimization, recruiting, system design, marketing, and networking.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

Certainly. There are many things that non-creatives and creatives often struggle to understand. Here are some insights to consider!

It’s crucial for arts entrepreneurs to generate multiple streams of income. My advise to secure meaningful opportunities that are:

1) Salary-based, which means long-term compensation for your services; generally lasting for years.

2) Contract-based, which means long-term compensation generally lasting for at least one year.

3) Project-based, which means short-term compensation for your services; generally lasting less than a year.

As an arts business owner and operator, I strongly encourage costumers and business owners (which includes arts entrepreneurs) to consider my “4 Principles of Pre-Negotiation Ethics” when negotiating deals with sub-contractors:

Option 1: If you ARE willing and able, then meet the sub-contractor (perhaps it is another arts entrepreneur) at their request.

Option 2: If you ARE willing but unable, then provide more accommodations that alleviate your sub-contractor’ responsibility for maintaining their respective business or career goals.

Option 3: If you are NOT willing but able, then proceed with the inquiry of another sub-contractor that you can afford. It’s important to respect everyone’s rates. Don’t question sub-contractor’s rates unless you are truly interested in working with them and wish to understand how/why the sub-contractor came up with that financial figure for their service.

Option 4: If you are NOT willing and unable, then positively proceed an inquiry with another sub-contractor.

Before you set your prices for the contractor’s inquire, consider my “8 Steps for Establishing Rates:”

STEP 1: Who and how many people/roles would the contractor have to hire to replace you?

STEP 2: How many roles are within the task being asked of you?

STEP 3: What is the ROI (Return of Investment) of the product or service you are providing to the contractor?

STEP 4: Where does the quality and merit of your products and services rank among the industry’s
best?

STEP 5: To what level is your passion and dedication towards the vision of the product and service that is being required by the contractor for you to make? If your passion and dedication level is higher than normal, then you should be compensated more because it means that you will exceed the expected hours to create the product or service and even allot opportunities to refine the product or service so that your contractor is absolutely satisfied.

STEP 6: Remember not to charge by the hour. Your rate is based on the quality of your product, the distinguishability of your company’s brand identity, and track-record for producing meaningful results that are competitive to your contemporaries.

STEP 7: Consider this quote – “People do not pay for your service; they are paying for you to prioritize their dream within your schedule.” This is a truthful quote by the acclaimed YouTuber known as “The Futur” (and yes, without the ‘e’)!

STEP 8: Consider the differences for the definition of the word, “talent.” The A-school (arts) equate talent with a person’s innate ability to do a task a higher-than-normal level, often times producing a sense of wonder. The B-school (business) equates ’talent’ with creating excellently within time reduction. So when you set your prices, consider the B-school’s definition.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.josevalentino.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/josevalentinomusic
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/josevalentinomusic/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCH491vsVUX6ETQ2EuMQHldg

Image Credits
Chike Okwudiafor