Kanya King CBE, founder of the MOBO Awards, dies aged 57
Kanya King died peacefully on 3 June 2026, surrounded by family and close friends, the MOBO Organisation has announced.
A pioneering figure in British music and culture, King founded the MOBO Awards in 1996 after remortgaging her home to create a national platform for Black music at a time when she had little institutional or industry backing.
The first MOBO Awards was broadcast just six weeks later, beginning what would become one of the UK’s most significant music platforms. Over three decades, the awards championed and celebrated artists including Stormzy, Little Simz, RAYE, Craig David, Soul II Soul, Ms. Dynamite, So Solid Crew, Kano, Amy Winehouse, Sade, Central Cee and Olivia Dean.
In its statement, the MOBO Organisation said King had created ‘an act of cultural justice’, adding that MOBO ‘did not just celebrate Black music; it legitimised it, amplified it, and demonstrated its commercial and creative power to a world that had too often chosen not to see it’.
King was made a CBE in 2018 for services to music and culture and received an Ivors Academy Honour in 2025.
Speaking on stage at the MOBO Awards in Newcastle in February 2025, shortly after her diagnosis, King 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.’
The MOBO Organisation said: ‘The world was a profoundly better place with Kanya King in it. The MOBO family is heartbroken, but also endlessly grateful, proud and inspired by everything she gave to music, culture and the generations who will follow in her footsteps.’
The 2026 MOBO Awards, taking place in the organisation’s 30th anniversary year, will be dedicated to King’s memory.