Wizkid

CTL-E-5806 · Person · musician · 1990–present

STRONG EVIDENCE evidence grade — master store (canonical CSV)

VERIFIED evidence grade — build store (JSON graph)

Combined Graph record U-01210 · provenance: canonical master store (CSV), record CTL-P-0191 + build store (JSON graph), record CTL-E-5806. Master record source: CTL seed 2026-10-16 — UNVERIFIED, verify before public citation.

Wizkid, born Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun on 16 July 1990 in the Ojuelegba area of Surulere, Lagos, Nigeria, is a Nigerian singer and songwriter who became a central voice of the Afrobeats generation. He began recording at age eleven with church friends in the group the Glorious Five and signed to Banky W's Empire Mates Entertainment in 2009. His debut album Superstar (2011) made him a national star, and Ayo (2014) carried "Ojuelegba," the record that carried his name abroad. In 2016 he featured on Drake's "One Dance," which reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and topped charts in fourteen additional countries. He signed with RCA Records in 2017 and released Sounds from the Other Side that year. His fourth album, Made in Lagos (2020), produced "Essence," featuring Tems, which became the first Nigerian song to reach the Top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at No. 9. He won a Grammy Award as a featured artist on Beyoncé's "Brown Skin Girl," and his sixth album, Morayo, followed in 2024.

The record

• Also known as: Ayodeji Balogun, Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun, Starboy
• Role(s): musician

Notes

Staged 2026-10-16 under CTL-GOV-006 (Census Intake Wave 2 — 747 Program, Wave 8; 40-record packet). Gate A (2026-10-16): no Wizkid entity in the live graph at 3,523 entities (exact / normalized / alias + token containment); ID CTL-E-5806 free. Supply: 747 Supply Ledger, Tier 3 — Famous Birthdays ABSENT census, readiness rank 475 (World Music Singers list). The census supplied the NAME ONLY; no fact in this record is sourced to it (CTL-GOV-004). SCOPE GATE: PASS — Nigerian Afrobeats — African/diaspora scope. Vital status: LIVING — sixth album Morayo released in 2024 and live dates listed through 2025 (Wikipedia; Rotterdam Style event listing). STATISTICS (sourced, dated): "One Dance" reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and topped charts in 14 additional countries (2016); "Essence" peaked at No. 9 on the Hot 100, the first Nigerian song in its Top 10 — Wikipedia / GRAMMY.com, accessed 2026-10-16. MEDIA: photo HELD (candidate: Wikimedia Commons and label/press photography of this subject exists; no file page was read at file-page level in this pass, so no image is cleared — CTL-PHOTO-001; a CTL-created graphic is the standing alternative); chart FILLED (charts/chart-ctl-e-5806-wizkid.svg); video HELD (the Shorts Link Map catalog was checked by name and variants — no matching-entity CTL Short exists for this subject); audio HELD (no CTL-owned or rights-cleared matching-entity audio; the subject's recordings are third-party copyrighted material). MEDIA LAYER (staged 2026-10-16; full per-asset PHOTO-001 records + embed specs in the packet's staged JSON, Drive packet folder): map = N/A (Person records carry no map slot under the media-layer rule; maps attach to places and institutions.) | visual_assets = HELD: | chart = FILLED (CTL-created SVG (black / deep red / gold) built only from this record's sourced facts) | video = HELD (No matching-entity CTL Short in the Shorts Link Map catalog (checked by name and variants), and no official/em) | audio = HELD (No CTL-owned or rights-cleared matching-entity audio at staging; the subject's own recordings are third-party )

Relationships

• Drake — collaborated with
  Wizkid featured on Drake's "One Dance" (2016), which reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
• Soul Train Music Awards 2019 — honored by
  STRONG EVIDENCE
• Soul Train Music Awards 2021 — honored by
  STRONG EVIDENCE
• Tems — collaborated with
  Tems features on Wizkid's "Essence" (2020), the first Nigerian song to reach the Billboard Hot 100 Top 10.

Referenced by

• Asake — collaborated with → this record
• Made in Lagos — authored by → this record

Sources

• GRAMMY.com, "For The Record: How Wizkid Elevated Nigeria & Propelled The Ascent Of Afrobeats With 'Made In Lagos'" — "Essence" featuring Tems was the first Nigerian song to reach the Billboard Hot 100 Top 10, peaking at No. 9 — https://www.grammy.com/news/wizkid-made-in-lagos-essence-for-the-record-justin-bieber-remix-her-video-afrobeats-nigeria/ (primary source · build store)
• Wikipedia, "Wizkid" — born Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun, 16 July 1990, Ojuelegba, Surulere, Lagos; Glorious Five; E.M.E signing 2009; Superstar (2011); "One Dance" No. 1 Hot 100 (2016); RCA signing 2017; Morayo (2024); vital-status evidence (2024 album release) — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wizkid (build store)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Soul_Train_Music_Awards (verification source · master store)

Evidence note (master store)

Won The Ashford And Simpson Songwriter's Award at the Soul Train Music Awards 2019; Won Best Collaboration at the Soul Train Music Awards 2021 — per the published Soul Train Music Awards winners lists (per-year lists fetched in full during recovery Phase C, 2026-10-17)

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Record CTL-E-5806 · Combined Graph record U-01210 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · 3 sources · 6 mapped relationships.
Directory: all entity records · the knowledge graph

Researched and maintained by the CultureTechLens research program · CultureTechLens Combined Graph, Release 2026-11-04. Corrections are public: the corrections log.

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