July Jones

July Jones is a Slovenian singer, songwriter and producer of electro-pop who has made her career abroad. She was born Julija Aljaž on 3 July 1998 in Ljubljana, which is why she is on Muzika-Balkan, but she has lived outside Slovenia since she was 15. As a teenager she settled in London, and in 2025 the Slovenian press described her as having lived for years between Los Angeles and London.

Her mother sent her to music school, where she learned flute, singing and piano. She left Slovenia for a music programme in the United States, auditioned for Berklee College of Music, and instead moved to London to make pop music. With no contacts in the industry she spent her first year there busking on the street and sleeping on friends' sofas.

She first made a name as a songwriter. She has worked with BTS, Brooke Candy, Trevor Daniel and Maja Keuc as Amaya, wrote "More Than a Friend" and "Has Been" for the British singer Girli, and co-wrote Raiven's album REM.

Her own releases began with singles such as "Butterflies" (2021), with Suzi Wu and Girli. In 2022 she put out the EP Girls Can Do Anything and the mixtape Silly Little Dream, Pt. 1, and introduced herself to Slovenian audiences at EMA, the national Eurovision selection, reaching the final with "Girls Can Do Anything". In 2023 she won the Music Moves Europe Award as best new European artist and released "Beautiful People" and "Flower Girl".

At EMA 2025 she sang "New Religion" and made the two-act superfinal, where Klemen Slakonja won and she finished second. "Body of Work" and "Hysteria" followed, and in 2026 "Strip the Veil" and "Too Close to the Sun". She is openly LGBTQ+ and speaks up for women's and LGBTQ+ rights. The playlist gathers her official videos.