Brian McKnight’s Estranged Son Dead at 32 After Cancer Battle

Brian McKnight’s estranged son Niko McKnight has died, just two years after he was diagnosed with cancer. He was 32.

The news was shared by Niko’s uncle, Claude McKnight, in a three-minute video posted via TikTok. Claude acknowledged that he wasn’t sure if he wanted to address Niko’s passing.

“I’m not going off the script or anything like that. I’m just gonna be raw with how I’m feeling,” he said. “Niko was one of those amazing kids who was quirky and curious and ridiculously talented.”

“Amazing singer, an amazing guitar player, had a great eye as a photographer. He was one of those kids that, at least in my estimation, was somebody you always wanted to be around. And so it really sucks that he’s no longer with us,” Claude continued.

Claude also said he doesn’t generally “post a lot of really, really serious subject things or certainly family things” but that “ I wanted to post this about Niko, about his legacy, about how amazing he is — and not about what some of you may have heard about, you know, the family drama that has existed for quite some time in our family.”

“This is not the time of the play, but what I will say is, in any situation there’s always at least three sides to a story. There’s my side, your side, and the truth. And the truth, a lot of times, is somewhere in between,” Claude explained.

Unfortunately, he added, the dynamic remained the same in the family until Niko’s death.

“So here’s the thing. I don’t know exactly what was going on there. I know what I’ve seen. I know what I’ve heard from all parties involved. I try not to judge. I just try to be as loving to each person as I can be because apparently there’s so much hurt going on, or was so much hurt going on, that a lot of things didn’t get resolved,” Claude added.

“And again, I want to go back to Niko. I know that kid had a lot inside, a lot eating at him for a long, long, long time. I may have contributed to what happened with him. What I do know is he’s out of pain now, and so I can rejoice in the fact that he no longer has to go through the chemo and the radiation and everything else. I just want to uplift that young man and say we will see him again one day,” he concluded.

Brian shared Niko with his ex-wife, Julie McKnight. At one point he and his brother Brian McKnight Jr. performed as the group MCKNIGHT, but in recent years their father has acknowledged his relationship with his sons is “estranged.”

Months after Niko revealed his cancer diagnosis in January 2024, the elder McKnight referred to his four older children (he and Julie also share son Clyde and daughter Briana) as a “product of sin” in a video shared on Instagram.