‘Deeply missed’: ABC radio presenter James Valentine dies aged 64

Musician, author and ABC Sydney radio presenter James Valentine has died aged 64, after a two-year battle with cancer.

ABC managing director Hugh Marks said in a statement announcing the news that Valentine had been “a trusted companion for so many people, part of the rhythm of everyday life for generations of our Sydney audience.

“James brought warmth, wit, and humanity to radio as an exemplar of radio craft. His style was never about confrontation or noise – it was always about connection. James turned his patch of the Sydney airwaves into a place of companionship, and his daily presence will be deeply missed by his significant audience, and all of his colleagues at the ABC,” Marks said.

Fellow ABC presenter Robbie Buck said Valentine was “one of the greatest”.

“The joyous, irrepressible & unbelievably sharp James Valentine has left us. What a wonderful human to have worked with,” he posted on Blue Sky.

Wendy Harmer said on the platform he was a “lovely, clever man. You will be so missed!”

Valentine revealed his illness in March 2024, telling listeners he had been diagnosed with oesophageal cancer and would be taking a few months away from the studio to undergo surgery.

“The prognosis is that it’ll be fixed, but it’s a pretty dramatic fix. I know many of you have had to deal with this yourself, or had to deal with it in your family. This is hard to listen to,” he said at the time. “But I felt as though I wanted to spend some time and talk to you about it, and let you know what was occurring.”

In a piece published on the ABC website that day, Valentine said he had first felt ill the previous December, and was diagnosed soon afterward, but had delayed making the news public as he had only just moved back to ABC Radio Sydney’s weekday afternoon slot.

“It’s generally a jolly show, so let’s have a good time there for a few months rather than shade that whole time with my disease,” he wrote, adding that he expected to be away for “probably two or three months”.

He returned to the airwaves in August 2024, saying he was “in perfect health now,” although he was still undergoing treatment including regular endoscopy ultrasounds and scans to monitor whether the cancer had returned, as well as several other procedures.

During that show, he also discussed how he had changed treatment plans. He was originally going to receive five weeks of chemotherapy and radiotherapy before surgery to remove most of his oesophagus and fashion a new one by attaching the top of his stomach to his throat. Instead, he opted for a newer treatment that removed the cancer cells through surgery down his throat.

“The risk with a full esophagectomy is that it’ll take a very long time to recover, if at all. The risk with this is that you’ll recover – you’ll be fine again – but we’re going to have to keep a close eye for future cancer,” he told this masthead after the show.

In June 2025, he stepped away once more, after receiving another diagnosis – omentum cancer. Then, in February, while filling in for Afternoons presenter James O’Loughlin, he stepped down completely.

“It’s time for me to retire. This decision has been hard for me to make, but look, I think my health is giving me a pretty clear message that it still might be a while until I could return and resume broadcasting.”

Born in Victoria in 1961, Valentine grew up in Ballarat, the youngest of three boys where, despite the lack of jazz in the local record store, he developed a love of the form by listening to the ABC and borrowing records from the local library.

He left the town to study jazz in Melbourne and soon became a working musician, playing on Countdown with the likes of emerging pop acts Kids in the Kitchen and Pseudo Echo and touring with Joe Camilleri, Kate Ceberano and Sharon O’Neill. Then he joined the Models.

Six months later they had a huge hit with the song Barbados and the band spent most of the next few years on the road.

But that constant time away didn’t sit well with his then-girlfriend (later his wife) Joanne Corrigan, so he left the band and began looking around for a new career, eventually landing the role of afternoon presenter on ABC kids’ TV. More TV roles followed on Good Morning Australia, Simon Townsend’s TVTV and Kerri-Anne Kennerley’s afternoon program, Monday to Friday.

By 1993, he had had enough of TV (although he would later narrate the Come Dine with Me Australia for The Lifestyle Channel and review films for Showtime, both on Foxtel) and approached Peter Wall, then manager of 702 ABC, looking for casual shifts he that could hopefully lead to a full-time job. After a brief stint in Canberra, he eventually landed the 702 mornings slot, before moving to afternoons.

Despite departing the Models, Valentine kept his hand in musically, touring with James Valentine’s Upbeat Revue. Along the way he also wrote several books, including the JumpMan science fiction trilogy for young adult readers.

Valentine is survived by his wife and two adult children, Ruby and Roy.