Born into a poor family in Northeast Pennsylvania, Valencia overcame many early obstacles before succeeding in recording her debut album, "Reflections". With a pink elephant-distracted father who often scrounged to put food on the table, Valencia quickly learned to deal with the minimum in life. When her father disappeared, like his father before him, Valencia's mother struggled to maintain the household, keep a job, and raise three children. Valencia was forced to become independent at an early age.

With a naturally pure voice and an unrelenting interest in acting, Valencia pursued the arts as an escape to the struggles of her childhood. She visited New York City often and took advantage of local opportunities to act and sing. By the time she graduated from high school, she had already developed a healthy performance résumé. This early experience, an excellent academic record, and a natural talent with vast potential gained Valencia admission into New York University's Stella Adler Conservatory of Acting. It wasn't long before Valencia realized that her voice was her main passion and decided to leave acting school to attend a university of music. She combined her talent in music with her passion for acting by studying to become an opera singer at Westminster Choir College.

After completing her undergraduate studies, Valencia continued to perform professionally in order to gain a deep understanding of the many forms and beauties of music and its purpose in peoples' lives. Two years later, Valencia received a full scholarship to the University of Southern California's voice program seeking her Masters in Music. While there, she also taught voice as an adjunct professor and founded the Black Box Opera, an organization to introduce opera and classical music to inter-city children.

After completing her Masters degree, Valencia gained professional jobs on the concert stage in Southern California and New England. While performing though, Valencia saw small crowds and a lack of general interest in this art form. She wanted to bring her music to a more commercial level. With the purpose of making beautiful classically rooted music in a more popular form, she began her adventure with independent record label, Providence Records.

Valencia composed and/or arranged several of the tracks and wrote all of the original lyrics on the album (of which two are in Spanish and two are in Italian). The first song on the album, "Home", was written about the families and troops making the ultimate sacrifices in war. "'Home' was written as a tribute to the plight of the women whose husbands serve overseas in the military. I wanted to pay homage and show my appreciation of the sacrifices they are making." Vas said.

The tenth track, called "Remembrance" was written on the fifth anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001. "I saw a tribute and heard quotes from the people directly affected by the tragedy. It inspired me and I had to get my feelings down. The song is a general depiction of the weight and loss of that day." said Vas.

"Reflections" is the latest chapter in Valencia's story and will enable people to experience music at a new level by enhancing the emotional spark in the listening experience.

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