Helen Folasade Adu CBE known simply as Sade, was born in Ibadan, Nigeria in 1959 to a Nigerian father and British mother. She is a singer/songwriter and the lead vocalist of the band ‘Sade’. At age 4, Sade moved to the UK with her mother and at age 18, studied fashion design at Saint Martin’s School of Art. The band ‘Sade’ was formed in 1983. Their first album Diamond Life was released in 1984 with the single from the album, Your Love is King, reaching the top 10 in the UK singles charts. The album won the Brit Award for Best British Album in 1985. Since then, Sade has released 5 albums, Promise in 1985, for which she won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist, making her the first Nigerian-born artist to win such an award. Then Stronger Than Pride followed in 1988, Love Deluxe in 1992 and Lovers Rock in 2000. Lovers Rock secured Sade the Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Album in 2002. Her most recent album Soldier of Love was released in 2010. In 2018. Sade released Flower of the Universe and The Big Unknown. Both were soundtracks to various films for Disney and 20th Century Fox.
Sade is regarded as one of the most successful British female performers and acknowledged as a music and style icon. She received an OBE in 2002 for services to music, later receiving a CBE in 2017. Sade was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2023.
Photo By Thilo Parg – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=77070645
