Jon Batiste says docu became a ‘symphony of life’
LONDON—He planned to make a film about composing his first symphony, but in late 2021, award-winning musician Jon Batiste was nominated for 11 Grammy awards and his partner’s long-dormant cancer returned, so the movie became more a “symphony of life.”
“Imagine you’re onstage at the Grammys and you’re thinking about what’s going on back home,” Batiste said of the night in 2022 when he won five trophies, including one for best album.
“We just won the biggest award in music. But everything is put in proper perspective when life is giving you this sort of moment,” he said.
Batiste and his wife, journalist and author Suleika Jaouad, teamed up with filmmaker Matthew Heineman to make “American Symphony,” which was initially going to just capture Batiste’s creative process leading up to a performance at New York’s prestigious Carnegie Hall.
It did just that, and it also showed Jaouad going through a second bone marrow transplant while Batiste was winning awards.
“It felt really important to show what it’s really like to go through an illness like this ... with the hope that it might offer some companionship and comfort to people who are similarly in the trenches of treatment,” she said.
“I owe so much to them for having the bravery to open up their lives at such an unbelievably sensitive and critical juncture,” said Heineman who shot scenes in Jaouad’s hospital room, as well as Batiste’s bedroom.
‘Doing really well’
“I didn’t want to tell the story from the outside. I want it to be an experiential film with them through all the twists and turns,” he said.
Sitting alongside her husband in London, Jaouad said she was “doing really well” and despite being told that she would be in treatment indefinitely, she was focused on the present.
“My practice has become to try to live every day as if it’s my first, to wake up as a newborn, with a sense of curiosity and awe and wonder.”
Batiste has recently been nominated for another five Grammy Awards, and this time around, the couple expects to attend the event in 2024 together.
As for the film, which is available on from Nov. 29, Heineman hopes “it not only brings joy, but also provides a road map on how to confront difficult moments.”
I didn’t want to tell the story from the outside. I want it to be an experiential film . . . with all the twists and turns
Jon Batiste
Musician