A descendant of a – great Egba family. Fela Anikulapo Kuti was born on 15th October, 1938 in Abeokuta, Ogun State. He attended Abeokuta Grammar School where his father, Reverend Israel Ransome Kuti was the principal and also a music teacher. At school, Fela was in the Vanguard of entertainment always running around creating jokes and laughter. In form four, Fela and his friends formed a club known as ” The Planless Society”. The club, which prided itself in disobeying school rules and regulations, published a journal called “The Planless Times”. Still, at school in 1955, Fela met J.K. Braimoh who introduced him to music. He soon began to sing on the radio and at club shows. After school in 1956,- Fela secured a job as a clerk with the then office of Commerce and Industry. He quit after six months. Two years later in August 1958, at the age of nineteen Fela left Nigeria to study at the Trinity College of Music, London. While at Trinity, Fela and his bosom Friend-1. k. Braimoh formed the “Koola Lobitos” a Highlife band that played regularly and thrilled fellow Nigerians in London. The band composed great Highlife tunes like “Onidodo”, “Independence􀀯, “Ololufe”, etc. In London, Fela met and fell in love with pretty Remi Taylor and both later got married in 1961. In 1962, after finishing his studies, Fela returned home with his wife, Remi. He soon secured a job as a music producer in the then Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC). In 1967 as a result of a tough musical challenge, Fela scurried to Ghana with trumpeter Zeal Onyia.

While in Ghana he began to play African roots which he called Afrobeat. He later returned home and established the Afro Spot where he played Afrobeat. In 1969, Fela once again had a course to check out of the country. He left for America where he met and fell in love with Sandra Smith, a civil rights activist who changed his political orientation. In 1972, he changed Koola Lobitos to “The African 70 Band” then later in 1974, he established the Kalakuta Republic. On April 13, 1976, the Afrobeat King changed his name from Fela Ransome Kuti to Fela Anikulapo Kuti which according to him means ” the one who emanates greatness and who carries death in a pouch and who cannot be killed by human entity”.

On February 20, 1978, Fela Anikulapo Kuti as compensation for sticking with him through thick and thin married the 27 women who had been with him. Fela during his playing days used broken as his Lingua Franca so that his message cut across the whole country and was understood by both literates and illiterates. His evergreen tunes are ITT, Suffering and Smiling, Overtake Don Overtake, etc. It is evident that Fela during his playing days used his music to lampoon all unpopular government decisions. He died in August 1997