7 Nigerian Grammy Award Winners You Probably Didn’t Know

The Recording Academy Grammy Awards is the most respected award every musician aspires to earn as evidence of their career rise. You will be surprised that there are some Nigerian Grammy award winners you probably don’t know.

The Nigeria music includes many kinds of folk and popular music, some of which are known worldwide, each with their own techniques, instruments, and songs.

Below are some of the Nigerian Grammy award winners whose name you probably never encountered.

Lekan Babalola

Lekan Babalola is a Conga player who has not one, but two Grammys. His first Grammy came in 2006 for his work on the album “In the heart of the moon” by legendary Malian guitarist, Ali Farka Toure and Babalola got his second Grammy Award in 2009 for being on Cassandra Wilson‘s album “Lovely.”

The England based percussionist is married, with three children, to a jazz musician, Kate Luxmoore.

Sikiru Adepoju

A talented talking drum player, Adepoju won the Grammys in 1991 and 2009 in the Best Contemporary World Music Album.

Sikiru is a master of the talking drum and many other Yoruba percussion instruments. Born in Eruwa, Oyo State in Nigeria, Sikiru hails from the traditional lineage of Yoruba talking drummers culturally referred to as Ayan which means “one who has descended from drummers lineage,”

After moving to the San Fransico Bay Area in 1985, Sikiru joined the influential and pioneering Nigerian percussionist Babatunde Olantunji and his Drums of Passion. This marked a lengthy period of high productivity from Sikiru which saw him recording and performing throughout the world until a year before Olantunji’s death in 2003. During this period, he was introduced to Grateful Dead drummer, Mickey Hart, who has called Sikiru “The Mozart of the talking drum,” and employed him on many of his personal projects including the Grammy award winning albums Planet Drum (1991) and Global Drum Project (2009).

Kevin Olusola

Kevin is a beatboxer in the renowned acapella group Pentatonix and has won 3 Grammy awards in 2015, 2016 and 2017.

Kelvin picked up an award alongside his acapella band, Pentatonix, taking home the award in the ‘Arrangement, Instrumental or acappella’ category for their medley ‘Daft Punk’, a remake of Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky.

Olusegun Olumide Adeola Samuel (Seal)

Seal is Nigerian and that even visited the country recently. He has 4 Grammy awards, winning 3 in 1996 and 1 in 2011.

Sade Adu

Musician, Helen Folasade Adu popularly known as Sade Adu has 4 Grammys in her inspirational career and they were won in 1986, 1994, 2002 and 2011.

Born on January 16, 1959 in Ibadan, Nigeria. Raised in London by her English mother, Sade developed several interests as a teen, including singing, fashion design and modeling. She sang with a few local bands before signing with Epic Records and recording her first album, Diamond Life, in 1984. A huge hit in her native England, the album also had mass appeal across the pond thanks to such singles as “Smooth Operator.” In 1986, she won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist.

Hakeem Seriki

Hakeem Seriki, better known by his stage name Chamillionaire, is rapper, entrepreneur, and investor. He began his career independently with local releases in 2002,

he won a Grammy Award for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group for “Ridin'”

Ibra Ake

Nigerian-American producer, writer and filmmaker, Ibra Ake won his first Grammy Award at the 61st ceremony.

He won the award for Best Music Video for producing Childish Gambino’s critically acclaimed visuals for ‘This is America’.