Prior to his death, the leadership of the Moyo Nguvu Cultural Arts Center was passed on to his protégé Ms. Bathsheba Everett.  She was the Center’s third Executive Director, its first female black belt, and the youngest non-profit leader at the age of 21. She has reassumed leadership of the organization and is relaunching it with a new and expanded vision in 2018. Ms. Everett is supported in her efforts by another Moyo alumni, protégé and black belt student of Dr. Meeks, Ms. Cerise McCaston.

Ikhalipha Lateef Hodge, is the highest ranking student in the Moyo Nguvu System of African Martial Arts and continues to teach classes in Colorado.

There are countless others of all ethnic backgrounds who have been influenced and inspired by Dr. Meeks’ dedication to helping and healing the community. We invite you to share your stories here.

Dr. Meeks came to Denver in 1989 and co-founded the Moyo Nguvu Cultural Arts Center, Inc. When Moyo was just five years old, he purchased its first building in the Capitol Hill neighborhood. Two years later he sold and purchased a second larger facility. Since Moyo’s inception, more than 2,000 youth have graduated from Dr. Meeks’ nationally recognized Children’s Rites of Passage program. Many of these youth have pursued post-college and graduate education with an emphasis on social entrepreneurship, health sciences, and the arts. Through his School Visions program, Dr. Meeks conducted workshops, seminars, and classes in every school district in the Denver metro area, resulting in more than 25,000 direct youth contacts per year. In 2008, Dr. Meeks launched the Healthy Youth Healthy Futures program with funding from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. This program aimed to reduce health disparities in Black and Latino communities and reached over 10,000 people. 

Since 1990, the Moyo Cultural Arts Center hosted the largest public Kwanzaa Karimu.  It quickly became the largest celebration in the western region with an average of 1,200-1,500 attendees in the late 90s and early 2000s. Meanwhile, the Moyo Arts Ensemble performed at some of the most prestigious venues, arts fairs and festivals in Colorado reaching on average an additional 20,000 persons annually.

Dr. Meeks has designed programs, rites of passage and youth programs, and youth mentorship programs for other organizations around the country. He was an expert in the area of youth leadership, training and health, having received national recognition for these programs.

Media have featured him in local and national publications, and on television for his community work.  Dr. Meeks has received Urban Colors Arts and Mentoring “Lifetime Achievement Award” (2017), the Nation of Islam’s Doing for Self Award for his “Outstanding achievements and services to self and community” (2011), The African American Leadership Institute Mountain Award for his “Contributions in Human Services” (2004), Channel 7’s Everyday Hero Award (January 2003), noted in Urban Spectrum newspaper (2004) as African Americans Who Make a Difference. Was also featured in the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News in the early 1990s as one of the African Americans who is a “Mover and Shaker”.

While studying in the mid-80s, he was on the cutting edge of the school-based clinic movement in New York City. Dr. Meeks was responsible for designing and developing the first male involvement health and sex education program targeting teen fathers and sexually active teens (male or female) in the U.S. school system. His program included a condom-distribution pilot program and, by the second year of implementation, it provided services to ten community clinics and 12 NYC high schools.  He also published a paper as the key researcher for the American Public Health Association in 1985 titled, “The Role and Needs of the Male Partner in Reproductive Healthcare: A survey of Low-Income Inner City Males”.  Due to the success of the program, in 1987 Dr. Meeks received an award from the City of New York as “Outstanding Young Man of the Year”.  

Dr. Meeks graduated Howard University Undergraduate Pre-Medicine program in 1982. He went on to complete his post-graduate studies in acupuncture and oriental medicine at the First World Institute of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Harlem, NY and the International Institute of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Quebec, Canada.  By 1988, he had successfully completed the requirements and was conferred his Doctor of Acupuncture/Oriental Medicine degree. In 1989, he was the first African American licensed to practice acupuncture and oriental medicine in the State of Colorado.  His successful practice treated 1,700 patients on average annually.  Since 2003, he was a regularly featured speaker at Colorado’s annual “Sistah Summit”, addressing African American women on health issues. From 2009-2013, he served as a member the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s Minority Health Advisory Commission.  He also authored a number of health related articles in Denver’s Urban Spectrum Newspaper as well as Ebony Magazine.

It was in 1983 that Dr. Meeks began to take his drumming seriously while under the tutelage of the great elder Afro-Cuban drummer Montego Joe.  He cultivated a foundation in Afro-Cuban and Haitian rhythms, as well as a working knowledge of the Lucumi ritual rhythms (i.e., Guiro) and Oriki (song prayers).  He studied Afrikan with Master drummers like the late Malonga Casquelourd, Fred Simpson, Titos Sampa, and Chief Bey. He played professionally for over 25 years having played with Gil Scott Heron, Vinx, and numerous other renowned musicians. The Afrikan instruments he played included congas, djembe, djunjun, mbira, shekere, berimbau, dondo, tama, and bata. In 1997, he established Kush, an Afro-Caribbean Jazz band that played through-out the Colorado region.

Dr. Meeks produced two music CD’s: “Dr. Oba and the Drums of Asé” (1996); “Kush” Afro-Caribbean Jazz (2004)

Dr. Meeks martial arts studies began in 1968 and encompassed a variety of Asian martial systems, including: Shodokan, Jujitsu, Ninjitsu, TaeKwando, ChunChuan and TaiChiChuan, in which he competed earning brown and black belt rankings and Sifu status.  By the late 70s and early 80s he was a top fighter for Howard University AAU Tae Kwondo Team and The Dennis Brown Shaolin Wu Shu School in Washington, D.C. It was in the 80’s that he began an intensive study of Afrikan warrior system of Kupigana Ngumi. At the time of his passing, he was the highest ranking instructor and heir apparent to the late Dr. Hodari Mqulo who was the Master Grandfather of “Isinaphakade Samathongo”, a South Afrikan ancestral esoteric martial art.

Dr. Meeks goal was to build high character, spirituality, and exceptional skill in his students. In 2001, he produced and published a documentary called “Dance of The Scared Warrior” outlining his philosophy.

His teachers include Grand Masters: Charlie Williams, Nzazi Malonga, Dong Ja Yang, Curtis Black, Dennis Brown, Keith Blackmon, John Dinkins, Jose Santos; Professors Moses Powell and Ronald Duncan; Dr. Hodari Mqulo, Nganga Mfundishi Tolo-Naa, Mfundishi Maasi, Oso Tayari Casel, Mfundishi Bakari Kalinda, and Mfundishi Nana Sakyi.

Born in 1958, Dr. Stephen A. Meeks, B.S, D.Ac., L.Ac. grew up in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York, and was raised in the Afrikan-Cuban, Yoruba-Lucumi religious traditions. He was a master of several disciplines and achieved significant accomplishments in multiple fields.


I have organized this brief biography by discipline, and have attempted to capture, to the best of my ability, these accomplishments. Any omissions are not intentional.