Andy Kershaw, a globe-trotting radio host for the BBC who introduced millions of listeners to an eclectic mix of music from around the world — Delta blues, Sufi devotionals, Zimbabwean pop — and then took an unexpected turn into war reporting from places like Haiti, Rwanda and Thailand, died at his home in Todmorden, England, north of Manchester, on April 16. He was 66.
His sister, the radio host Liz Kershaw, announced the death, from cancer, on his website.
Beginning in 1985, Mr. Kershaw was among the most recognizable voices on British radio, and among its biggest personalities. He was beloved — most of the time — for his strong opinions on music, politics and professional motocross, of which he was an enormous fan.
Though he first made his name as a promoter of British rock acts from the 1980s, he later soured on most of them. U2? Overrated. David Bowie? A self-promoter. Phil Collins? Don’t even ask.
He refused to wait for music to come to him from record companies and public-relations firms. Instead, he voraciously scoured record bins and tiny music clubs, searching for new sounds. His goal, he said more than once, was to “give people not what they wanted, but what they didn’t know they wanted.”
Increasingly, that meant venturing beyond the confines of standard British rock fare.
“With the ’80s coming to a close, I just thought, there are fewer and fewer rock bands which are exciting me,” he told The Guardian in 1992. “Then I thought, instead of spending 10 quid on a rock LP, I’m going to have far more fun if I spend this 10 quid on an LP from Zaire.”
In the early 1990s, he began going to where the music was made — Haiti, Mali, Pakistan, among others — and bringing back not just live recordings, but his impressions of the people, politics and culture.
He became something like an Anthony Bourdain of world music, exposing listeners to new artists and cultures in an effort to persuade them that so-called world music was as sophisticated and enjoyable as anything coming out of London or Liverpool.
Mr. Kershaw also developed a side hustle as a freelance correspondent, usually for The Independent, filing offbeat but essential reports from conflict zones. He sneaked into Rwanda from Burundi during the 1994 genocide, and in 2010 he reported from Thailand during the monthslong Red Shirts protests against military rule.
He wrote with a blend of British world-weariness and Hunter S. Thompson-esque mania, filing stories about hunting down the anise-flavored spirit arak in Baghdad and dodging gunfire in Port-au-Prince.
“So the next time you hear a big rock band complaining their sandwiches are the wrong shape,” he told The Guardian in 2010, “this puts it all in context.”
Andrew Kershaw was born on Nov. 9, 1959, in Littleborough, a suburb of Manchester. His parents, John and Eileen (Acton) Kershaw, were school headmasters.
He attended the University of Leeds, but left in 1982 without graduating. In addition to studying, he had spent much of his time there working as the student entertainment coordinator, booking acts like Dire Straits, the Clash and Iggy Pop. He once paid Duran Duran out of his own pocket because the band, not yet world famous, could not afford to wait for their check to clear.
He went on to work briefly for a radio station and then spent a year as a roadie for the British singer-songwriter Billy Bragg.
Using connections he made through Mr. Bragg, he landed a spot as a host for the BBC. Tens of millions of viewers first encountered Mr. Kershaw in 1985, when he was one of the lead hosts for the London side of Live Aid, a one-day, trans-Atlantic double concert to benefit starving children in Ethiopia. (Phil Collins, Mr. Kershaw’s nemesis, famously played both Wembley Stadium and, thanks to Concorde, John F. Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia.)
In his 15 years as a prime-time radio host, Mr. Kershaw developed a large following with his unpredictable set lists. But executives at the BBC soured on him as his tastes grew more eclectic.
After the BBC replaced his program in 2000 with a dance show, he moved to a different station and began producing music documentaries.
He was still one of the country’s most popular D.J.s when his life began to unravel.
In 2006, he and his longtime partner, Juliette Banner, and their two young children moved to the Isle of Man, in part for the island’s famed motorcycle races. Soon after, Ms. Banner found a text message on his phone revealing that he had cheated on her.
She kicked him out of the house. He stopped broadcasting, began drinking heavily and suffered a nervous breakdown the next year.
He also began to harass Ms. Banner, and violated a series of restraining orders and court warnings. In 2008, he served several months in prison.
Eventually, he quit drinking and went back on air for the BBC, hosting a TV documentary series. He published a memoir, “No Off Switch,” in 2011, and later hosted “The Andy Kershaw Podcast.”
Along with his sister, Mr. Kershaw is survived by his children, Sonny and Dolly Kershaw.
He received a cancer diagnosis in 2025. His friend and podcast producer, Peter Everett, revealed the news in a Facebook post in January.
Mr. Kershaw’s assessment of his chances of survival, included in the post, was typically sarcastic.
“I am determined not to die before Benjamin Netanyahu, Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and Ant & Dec,” he told Mr. Everett, referring to a pair of well-known British TV hosts. “That should keep me going for a while.”
Clay Risen is a Times reporter on the Obituaries desk.
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