Jon Batiste & His Wife Skipped the Grammys After She Was Diagnosed With Cancer Again—He Made ‘Everything Better’ When She Was at Her ‘Lowest’
Jon Batiste will always stay at his wife’s side. The American Symphony musician cites his wife as his muse, and their love is indeed something to cry over.
Jon Batiste was documenting his process in writing his first symphony in his documentary American Symphony when his wife was diagnosed with cancer again. What emerged was raw footage of the lengths they’ll go for each other’s love. Director Matthew Heineman admired the couple’s ability to be each other’s rock throughout the turbulent times. “Jon and Suleika are both radically, inescapably authentic,” he told Netflix. I’ve truly never met people who know themselves so well. And despite all of the points at which they could deviate from being who they are, they both stay radically authentic. That was a beautiful thing to capture.”
Who is Jon Batiste’s wife?
Jon Batiste’s wife is Suleika Jaouad. She’s an Emmy Award-winning journalist and New York Times bestselling author. She’s best known for her column Life, Interrupted. She was diagnosed with a rare form of acute myeloid leukemia in 2011.
She was told she had a 35% survival rate, and reconnected with Jon Batiste, whom she met at band camp when they were younger. He showed up with a band and played music for her. “To my surprise, he showed up with his entire band,” she wrote in a piece for her column. “Every inch of the 25-room floor was filled with music. Timidly at first, and then with jubilation, patients, nurses and other hospital workers began to dance and clap.”
In 2021, the cancer came back and she undergone a second bone marrow transplant. On filming the process between her and her partner in American Symphony, she told Harper’s Bazaar, “We didn’t think about the film being everywhere, partly because the moments we were living through—the wedding, the transplant, all of these milestones of life—you have to be present in that. We didn’t know if it would be a happy ending,” he says. “And then the pressures of the professional side of things piling on at the same time … We weren’t thinking about making a movie. We were thinking about making it through the day, and that was something that we decided to keep filming.”
The two got married in 2022 right before her procedure. “We got married the day before I was admitted to the hospital to undergo my bone marrow transplant,” Jaouad said. “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,” she added. “This is not, you know, a hasty decision!”
Her cancer went away and she later talked about how making the film was a clear reflection to her and her husband. “When this happened to me, especially the second time, it was a very clear rerouting of priorities. I had such limited energy during the bulk of my bouts with cancer treatment that I had maybe about three good hours every day,” she says. “When you have only two to three good hours in a day, you have to get very clear on what is most important to you—what you want to do in those hours and who you want to spend it with and how.
In December 2024, she wrote that the cancer came back for a third time. Suleika shared a post on Instagram revealing that she found out she had cancer “for the third time.”
She wrote, “Like life, my health was in flux. I felt healthier than ever only to learn my leukemia was back. I had to adjust to a grueling monthly chemo regimen. My dad stepped in as my caregiver and I’ve cherished our one-on-one time.”
She cited Jon to be a rock in the turbulent times. “And then there’s my greatest joy—my husband @jonbatiste who’s been by my side at every turn on the roller coaster. I didn’t know a love like this was possible. He makes everything better. This year I felt my lowest and most defeated and also had some of the wildest, most beautiful moments of my life. Life is all flow all the time and there is a comfort in that flux. Like how I went straight from five days of chemo to taking our family on a special trip.”
The couple skipped out on the 2025 Grammys to have a “lazy sunday.” Batiste won Best Music Film and Song Written For Visual Media for American Symphony.
