Sandra Izsadore
Singer, songwriter, composer, author, and activist who met Fela Kuti in Los Angeles in 1969 when his band Koola Lobitos toured America. Former Black Panther living at the center of the Black Power movement. Was astonished at how little Fela knew of his own African culture—at the time he didn't believe there was any. Set about educating and radicalizing this child of a privileged family, introducing him to the writings of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., and Angela Davis. Fela stayed at her house for weeks, absorbing ideas he'd never encountered. "From that day forward," Fela said, "I changed my sound and the way I see Africa." She gave him the political vocabulary and confidence to claim Africa on his own terms. Without Sandra Izsadore, there is no Afrobeat—Fela returns to Lagos and keeps playing directionless highlife-jazz fusion.