Just two weeks after his posthumous 83rd birthday, Fela Anikulapo Kuti was honoured in London with a Blue Plaque on Monday.
The award was given to him by English Heritage, which placed a blue plaque on the house at 12 Stanlake Road in Shepherd’s Bush, where Fela first stayed when he arrived in London to study music.
The plaque read: Fela Anikulapo Kuti(1938-1997), singer, multi-instrumentalist, composer and Nigerian activist. Lived in this house as a student in 1958″.
Fela arrived in London from Nigeria in 1958 to study medicine. However, he chose to study music at Trinity College of Music instead.
The rest is history.
Fela has now joined the ranks of other notable musicians who have received the blue plaque from English Heritage.
Like Fela, Bob Marley, one of the most important musicians of the twentieth century, has a blue plaque on the house where he and The Wailers completed their legendary album Exodus.
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Jimi Hendrix, the guitarist and songwriter who became an overnight success when his band’s first single, ‘Hey Joe,’ was released in 1966, was also honoured.
According to the English Heritage website, London’s iconic blue plaques connect the people of the past with the buildings of the present.
The London blue plaques scheme, which is now maintained by English Heritage, was established in 1866 and is thought to be the world’s oldest of its kind.
Across the capital over 950 plaques, on buildings humble and grand, honour the notable men and women who have lived or worked in them.
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