aja monet

Born in New York and raised in East New York, Brooklyn, aja monet has developed since adolescence a practice situated between oral poetry, spoken word, jazz, soul, blues and hip-hop, where the text remains central but takes shape within flexible, meditative and often collective musical forms. Her trajectory first emerged on New York’s slam and performance poetry scene: in 2007, at 19, aja monet became the youngest winner of the Grand Slam at the Nuyorican Poets Café. Poet, author, lyricist and activist, aja monet has since pursued a path linking performance, writing and cultural organizing, notably in Miami where she co‑founded Smoke Signals Studio, a space combining creative work and community engagement, before settling in Los Angeles. In the musical field, aja monet has collaborated with artists such as Saul Williams, Eryn Allen Kane and the Smoke Signals Collective, refining a form of spoken word accompanied by jazz and soul arrangements. Her first album, when the poems do what they do, was released in 2023 with contributions from Chief Xian aTunde Adjuah, Samora Pinderhughes and Marcus Gilmore. There, aja monet extends a political and intimate writing, carried by calm diction, a pronounced sense of rhythm and a constant attention to Black voices, diasporic memories and forms of resistance.