Entrepreneur Kanya King, who founded the Music of Black Origin (MOBO) Awards to champion Black musicians in the UK, has died at the age of 57.
In a statement, MOBO Awards said she “passed away peacefully on 3 June 2026 after a courageous and characteristically determined battle with colon cancer”.
Kanya King remortgaged her home 30 years ago to launch the initiative. Artists including Stormzy, Little Simz, RAYE, Craig David, Ms. Dynamite, Amy Winehouse and Central Cee have been celebrated by her awards.
In an interview with the Evening Standard in 2017, King said when she got pregnant aged 16 and dropped out of school she “felt kind of written off — that I wasn’t going to amount to much.” She related how a careers adviser told her she might get a job as a manager at Sainsbury’s if she was lucky. “That put a fire in my belly and gave me the motivation to say ‘Why should I not have ambition, little is expected of me?’,” she said.
“What Kanya created was never simply an awards ceremony. It was an act of cultural justice,” the statement announcing her death continued.
“MOBO did not just celebrate Black music; it legitimised it, amplified it and transformed the cultural landscape of the UK.
“She built a platform that reached hundreds of millions of people around the world. She was awarded a CBE and received an Ivors Academy Honour in 2025. She never stopped. She never asked for permission. She never accepted that the word “no” was final.
“When she stood on the MOBO stage in Newcastle in February 2025, just months after her diagnosis, she told the audience: “I never allowed someone to define my limits. Not in life. Not in business. And I’m certainly not going to have that happen now.”
Among those paying tribute were Stormzy who posted dove and heart emojis on Instagram.
Mis-Teeq singer Alesha Dixon said King was an “incredible woman” who “helped so many people”, London Mayor Sadiq Khan said she was “a true pioneer” who “changed the face of culture and music”, and culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said she was “a real pioneer who changed British music for the better.”