Niagara Music Awards ready to rock online
Show’s 13th year goes remote this weekend with performances and 24 awards to be given out
The pandemic may have devastated Niagara’s music scene this year, but the party goes on for the annual Niagara Music Awards. Remotely, of course. Organizers will livestream the event for its 13th year on Saturday night.
In addition to announcing winners in 24 categories, there will be pre-taped performances from Niagara artists Riley Michaels, G.ORGE, Breaking Still, VALERIE and the Bryan Sorensen Groove Trio.
Organizer Todd Brown said putting this year’s show on was like handling a “newborn baby” — everything had to be redone from the ground up.
“Everything this year is different,” he said. “It’s exciting but it’s very stressful. I think it’s turning out all right.
“So far, everything is very well done and to our level of expectation. I expect the show to be the same.”
The show will feature pre-taped messages from Canadian acts including Sum 41 and Three Days Grace.
Getting special global achievement awards will be Fort Erie producer Murda Beatz and Grammynominated Niagara Falls songwriter Stephan Moccio.
The show will be produced by Jukasa Media Group and hosted by Patrick Gagliardi.
Brown said about 650 submissions poured in for the awards, including a robust number of hiphop entries. It resulted in 18 nominees for hip-hop artist of the year, the most for any category in the show’s history.
“The hip-hop scene is alive and strong in Niagara,” said Brown.
Niagara artists Mel Monaco, Jimmy Stahl, Genevieve-renee Bisson, G.ORGE, Beepax and last year’s big winner, Ryan Lunn, lead the way with multiple nominations each.
Brown said the quality of submissions, during such a chaotic year, shows the backbone of the Niagara music community.
“The talent is unbelievable,” he said. “We feel guilty having to even put out nominees. There are people not on that list (whose) content is phenomenal. But at the end of the day, there can only be so many in this format.”
The show starts at 7 p.m. Saturday and can be viewed at niagaramusicawards.ca.