Mon Rovîa on leaving war‑torn Liberia and finding success in US folk‑pop

Mon Rovîa, born Janjay Lowe, is a Liberian‑born singer‑songwriter who has risen to prominence in the US with poetic folk‑pop that has packed theatres and attracted millions of listeners. He began life in Liberia during a brutal civil war; after his mother died his grandmother placed him and his siblings with others for their safety and he was the only member of his family to escape the conflict.

'That is something that weighed heavy on me as I grew,' he says. 'Why was it me? Why couldn’t my siblings come, or why wasn’t it one of them?' He was later placed with a white missionary family from Florida and grew up in a white, American, middle‑class environment. Taking the stage name Mon Rovîa, a stylised version of the Liberian capital Monrovia, he addresses fractured identity and the legacy of colonialism in his songwriting.

He dubs his sound Afro‑Appalachian folk, noting a west African predecessor of the banjo and saying 'you just see that these things have been whitewashed over time.' His music drew comparisons to Nick Drake and Labi Siffre, and his rise accelerated after a friend and future manager, Eric Cromartie, encouraged him to post stripped‑back ukulele clips on TikTok; within weeks he 'blew up'.

In 2024 he signed with Nettwerk Music Group and stopped working day jobs to focus on music.

Key Topics

Culture, Mon Rovîa, Janjay Lowe, Liberia, Monrovia, Bloodline