When the Beatles arrived on America’s shores in 1964, they changed Janet Macoska’s world through their music. Unlike every other 10-year-old infatuated with the Fab Four, however, they set her on an unwavering career path.
Paging through copies of her mother’s Life magazines, she had seen how great photographs enhanced the real story of a celebrity like James Dean. So she dug her father’s Kodak duaflex twin lens reflex camera out of the front closet and started taking pictures of everyone and everything in her neighborhood.
“I couldn’t play music, and I was not going to be a musician, but I knew I could be a photojournalist,” Janet recalls.
To gain entrée to the exact place she knew she needed to be, the plucky pre-teen befriended Top 40 radio disc jockeys like Jerry G. at KYW and Big Jack Armstrong at WIXY-1260 who would give her Beatles records to run a fan club or answer fan mail for them. They also let her come down to their stations to meet emerging rock music superstars. In 1967, an interview with Sonny & Cher led to her first published photo in Teen Screen Magazine when she was 12.
“I didn’t approach it like the screamy little girl or someone who couldn’t be in front of a famous person, so they all treated me like a little adult,” Janet says. “Photographers know, if you conduct yourself in a certain way, you can start documenting everything in the entire world with your camera, so that’s what I did.”
She joined her high school newspaper, and although the nuns weren’t thrilled about running articles about the Beatles or other rock musicians, she snuck some in anyway. Next, she attended Tri-C, where she studied journalism and learned how to use a camera, especially to photograph musicians jumping around on stage. She also convinced the faculty moderator to use her stories about rock bands and concerts when other students neglected to turn in their articles.
The gutsy fledgling photojournalist talked her way into Belkin Productions, informing them that most of their audiences were college kids, and she wanted to cover the concerts they were promoting. Belkin gave her two tickets to every show and helped her obtain photo passes from the bands’ management. The record companies bought into her concept and sent her newly released albums. Then WMMS exploded onto the scene in the 1970s, connecting Cleveland and Janet to emerging acts that were taking over the rock world, from David Bowie to Bruce Springsteen. “We got to hear music ahead of everybody else,” she says.
Among her favorite shoots, she photographed Devo in Akron for a British publication before they were well-known in America, and she spent a day on Coventry with Debbie Harry from Blondie, taking pictures of her at Record Revolution and at a private residence down the street.
Although she never did see the Beatles perform, she went to become one of a small handful of professional photographers Paul McCartney allowed on his tours. In fact, one of her images is the only performance shot of Sir Paul that hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in London. As one of the preeminent rock photographers in the world, Janet’s photos have been used by numerous rock artists for their promotional materials from album covers and websites to books, including the back cover photo on rock guitar legend Jimmy Page’s autobiography.
Over the years, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum has displayed countless photos of Janet’s, especially since she has an abundant stock of historic photos of the iconic rock acts including The Sensational Alex Harvey Band, Led Zeppelin, Alice Cooper, the Clash, Queen, Talking Heads and Nirvana. From 1974 to 1985, she also photographed her beloved Cleveland Indians, and has photographed film stars such as Jimmy Stewart and Maureen O’Hara.
“Janet’s work has always been dramatic and perceptive, able to separate the person from their persona so highly groomed and guarded by the artist and their management,” says Peter Chakarian, author and culture reporter, cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer. “Today, photographers take thousands of shots in seconds digitally. She had to wait for the perfect moments to happen so that she could capture them with her artist’s eye and her rock and roll fan’s heart.”
Janet is currently working with Michael Stanley’s daughters to select photographs for a book about the late Cleveland rock legend, who was a close friend. Chakarian is co-authoring the book they will start pre-selling before the holidays this year for publication next spring. She also collaborated with him on ALL ACCESS CLEVELAND – The Rock and Roll Photography of Janet Macoska published by Cleveland Landmarks Press in 2015.