Aaron Jafferis is a hip-hop poet and playwright whose honors include a Creative Capital Award, Richard Rodgers Award, Sundance Institute/Time Warner Fellowship, NEFA National Theatre Project Grant, Edgerton Foundation New American Play Award, a MacDowell Fellowship, Barbour Playwright’s Award, NYMF Most Promising New Musical Award, and The Dramatist’s “50 To Watch.”
He is currently working with composer Byron Au Yong on Trigger, an oratorio for 32 college singers prompted by the Virginia Tech Tragedy.
His musicals Stuck Elevator, How to Break, Kingdom, Blood Magic, Shakespeare: The Remix, and No Lie have been produced, presented, or developed by The Old Globe, Public Theater, American Conservatory Theater, Sundance Theatre Lab, Atlantic Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and many others. A former Open Rap Slam champion at the National Poetry Slam Championships, Jafferis teaches poetry and hip-hop theatre in schools and health centers in his hometown of New Haven. He earned a BA from UC Berkeley and an MFA from New York University Tisch Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program.