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Artist Jon Batiste is married to author Suleika Jaouad. The singer tied the knot with his longtime partner back in February 2022.
While speaking on CBS Sunday Morning, Jaouad said that they wanted to get married after she was diagnosed with leukemia for the second time. She said,
“We got married the day before I was admitted to the hospital to undergo my bone marrow transplant. We have known that we wanted to get married, I think, from the first week that we started dating. That’s when Jon first brought up the topic of marriage to me. So, we’ve had eight years. This is not, you know, a hasty decision!”
Although they married before Suleika’s bone marrow transplant, she said that her diagnosis was not a reason for Jon to pop the question. She mentioned,
“He said to me, ‘I just want to be very clear, I’m not proposing to you because of this diagnosis. It’s taken me a year to design your ring. So, just know this timing has nothing to do with it. But what I do want you to know is that this diagnosis doesn’t change anything. It just makes it all the clearer to me that I want to commit to this and for us to be together. But once we realized we had this tiny window before the bone marrow transplant, we decided to go for it.”
Everything known about Suleika Jaouad, Jon Batiste’s wife
Suleika Jaouad is the author of the Life, Interrupted column in The New York Times. Born on July 5, 1988 in New York City, she is of mixed ethnicity as her father was Tunisian and her mother was Swiss.
The 33-year-old was diagnosed with cancer in 2011 and doctors said that she had a 35% chance of survival. She survived the fatal condition and frequently speaks about her medical experiences.
Jaouad graduated from Princeton University in 2010 with a major in Near Eastern Studies and a double minor in Gender Studies and French. She worked on different human rights campaigns for the Center of Constitutional Rights, Oxfam, and the African Union.
Suleika studied abroad in Morocco, Tunisia, and Egypt, researching and writing on women’s issues. She travels across the US to teach writing and speaks at high schools, universities, hospitals, corporations, fundraisers, and professional events.
She was featured on NPR’s Talk of the Nation, NBC’s Weekend Today, CBS News, The Paris Review, Los Angeles Times, Darling Magazine, and others.
More about Jon Batiste and Suleika Jaouad’s marriage
Jon Batiste and Suleika Jaouad were able to get married quickly and had a tiny and perfect wedding. In her most recent interview, Jaouad stated that they used bread ties instead of formal wedding rings. She said,
“And I’ll tell you, we talked into that bone marrow transplant unit on cloud nine. We were so happy, so brimming with love and positivity from this beautiful evening that we’d had. And I really believe that that carried us through.”
While speaking to People in 2021, Jon Batiste opened up about creating his album We Are and how the track Show Me the Way is an example of the manifestation of his relationship with Jaouad. The songwriter said,
“It speaks to a lot of me growing up and also our relationship. It’s a beautiful thing to have that piece of our relationship sliced off into the album.”
The 35-year-old artist won five awards at the recent 64th Annual Grammy Awards, including the best music video and album of the year, and received 11 nominations.
