Femi Kuti Net Worth
Saxophonist Femi Kuti is well-known and has a net worth of $1.5 million. He was born on June 16, 1962, and is the famous singer and activist Fela Kuti’s son.
Femi Kuti is the popular name of a handsome man whose real name Olufela Olufemi Anikulapo Kuti. His a Nigerian musician who was born in London and reared in Lagos. He was born on June 16, 1962.
He is the oldest child of Fela Kuti, the father of Afrobeat, and the grandchild of Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, a political activist, women’s rights advocate, and traditional nobleman.
Femi Kuti started out as a member of his father’s band, Egypt 80. Femi formed his own band, Positive Force, in 1986 he created a career for himself as a musician separate from his father’s legacy.
Femi Kuti Biography
Femi Anikulapo Kuti was raised in the old capital of Nigeria, Lagos, and was born in London to Fela and Remilekun (Remi) Ransome-Kuti (née Taylor; 1941-2000). Soon after taking Femi to live with her, his mother abandoned his father.
Femi made the decision to live with his father, nonetheless, in 1977. At the age of 15, Femi began studying the saxophone and eventually joined his father’s band. Baptist Academy and Igbobi College were his places of study.
Like his father, Femi has made commitments to social and political causes throughout his career. Femi’s grandmother, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, was a political campaigner and women’s rights activist.
Though Femi is the son of an international icon, he considers his mother, Remilekun Taylor, to be his greatest influence.
He created his own band, Positive Force, in the late 1980s with Dele Sosimi (Gbedu Resurrection), former keyboard player of Fela Anikulapo Kuti.
His international career began in 1988 when he was invited by the French Cultural Centre in Lagos and Christian Mousset to perform at the Festival d’Angoulême (France), the New Morning Club in Paris and the Moers Festival in Germany.
In 2001, Femi collaborated on his album Fight to Win with a number of US musicians, including Common, Mos Def, and Jaguar Wright.
Also in 2002, Femi contributed a remake of his father’s classic song “Water No Get Enemy” to Red Hot & Riot, a compilation CD in tribute to Fela Kuti that was released by the Red Hot Organization and MCA.
Femi’s track was created in collaboration with hip-hop and R&B artists D’Angelo, Macy Gray, The Soultronics, Nile Rodgers and Roy Hargrove, and all proceeds from the CD were donated to charities dedicated to raising AIDS awareness or fighting the disease.
Femi Kuti’s voice is featured in the videogame Grand Theft Auto IV, where he is the host of radio station IF 99 (International Funk 99, described as “playing a great selection of classics from West Africa, the US and elsewhere”).
In similar fashion as his father, there have been complaints of Kuti’s criticism of his homeland Nigeria, specifically in the song “Sorry Sorry” along with “What Will Tomorrow Bring” and “97”.
Femi has been nominated for a Grammy award four times in the world music category in 2003, 2010, 2012 and 2013 but has never won.
On 19 December 2014 a management deal between Chocolate City Music Group and Femi Kuti was reached. The news was announced via the Chocolate City Music official Instagram account, as well as Audu Maikori social media accounts.
On 5 February 2021, Femi Kuti and his son, Made Kuti, released their two-album project, Legacy+ under Partisan Records. The project includes Femi’s eleventh album Stop the Hate and Made’s debut album For(e)ward.
Femi Kuti and his son Made Kuti launched their two-album project, Legacy+, through Partisan Records on February 5, 2021. The project features Made’s debut album For(e)ward and Femi’s eleventh album Stop the Hate.
Femi Kuti Activism
The son of Fela Kuti, an Afrobeat musician and political activist, Femi carried on his father’s passion for both music and politics. When he was 16 years old, he joined his father’s band and learned to play the saxophone and piano. After his father passed away, he took center stage and began writing and performing.
Femi remains politically inclined grooving to high energy funk, jazz and traditional African-fueled songs about political corruption, poverty and primitive living conditions suffered by most inhabitants in Nigeria’s oil-rich nation.
Femi Kuti’s album Africa for Africa emphasized “Bad Government” as a problem in Africa. Before the 2011 elections in Nigeria, he reached out to the people that there was “no difference between the three candidates contesting for the presidential seat in Nigeria”.
He added, “we could say we’re moving in the democratic process. And it’s probably better than going to war, but corruption is still very rampant. The people are hungry and sick. And the government controls the media, so it can’t be critical”.
Kuti also said: “It’s a very hypocritical situation. People settle for putting a meal on the table, but they don’t know that the rest of the world doesn’t suffer every day from power outages and water shortage.
Nigerians don’t even know about the history of African slavery, because it’s not included in the text books.” He echoed the same sentiments in the 2015 elections by releasing a remix to the song “Politics Na Big Business” featuring Tuface Idiibia and Sound Sultan through his management company, Chocolate City.
The song “Make We Remember” by Kuti encourages listeners to remember the words of his father and other “great black people” who struggled for Africa’s liberation. Femi has been utilizing music to uplift, inspire, and empower Africans for a very long time.
Femi Kuti Live performances
Femi Kuti and M.I (Jude Abaga), a member of his new label, performed on the same stage at the BMO event on November 22, 2014.
Alongside his brother Seun Kuti, he participated in the 2 Kings concert on April 24, 2015. The concert is notable because it is the brothers’ first time performing together.
On May 15, 2017, Femi Anikulapo Kuti was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for holding a single note on a saxophone using a technique called circular breathing. 51 minutes and 35 seconds was the record he set.
Femi Kuti Awards and honours
Kuti has had six Grammy Award nominations as of 2022, over a variety of categories. He received four nominations for Best World Music Album (in 2002, 2009, 2011, and 2013).
Femi and his son Made were nominated for the 2022 Grammy Awards in the categories of Best Global Music Album and Best Global Music Performance, respectively.
The French Ministry of Culture in Paris conferred Kuti with the title of Chevalier des arts et des lettres (Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters) on October 20, 2022.
Femi Kuti Father
Fela Anikulápó Kuti, also known as Abami Eda, was a Nigerian musician, bandleader, composer, political activist, and Pan-Africanist. He was born Olufela Olusegun Oludotun Ransome-Kuti on October 15, 1938, and passed away on August 2, 1997.
He is credited with founding the Nigerian music genre of Afrobeat, which fuses jazz and funk with West African music. He was hailed as one of Africa’s “challenging and charismatic music performers” at the height of his fame. He was dubbed “a musical and sociopolitical voice” of significant global relevance by AllMusic.
Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, an advocate for women’s rights in Nigeria, was the father of Kuti. He and his band Africa 70, which included drummer and musical director Tony Allen, rose to fame in Nigeria during the 1970s after some early experiences abroad.
During this time, he was a vocal opponent of and target of Nigeria’s military juntas. He established the commune known as the Kalakuta Republic in 1970, which proclaimed its independence from military administration.
In a raid in 1978 that injured Kuti and his mother, the commune was demolished. In 1984, the Muhammadu Buhari administration imprisoned him; nevertheless, he was freed after 20 months. He kept on performing and recording throughout the 1980s and 1990s. His son, Femi Kuti, has been in charge of his music’s reissues and compilations since his passing in 1997. Read More