23rd Maple Blues Awards

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ABOUT THE MAPLE BLUES AWARDS

The Maple Blues Awards is Canada’s national blues awards program. Its goal is to promote blues music across Canada, and to recognize outstanding achievement in the field. Winners in all categories (excluding the instrumental categories*) are decided by blues fans across Canada. Voting occurs online each November.

Nominating Panel & Steering Committee.  The nominees are selected by a distinguished panel of approximately 50 blues experts who form the MBA Nominating Panel. Co-chaired by the steering committee consisting of Terry Parsons, Yanick Theriault, John Valenteyn and Brant Zwicker, the panel includes radio hosts, journalists, and festival organizers regionally distributed across Canada. Members of the Nominating Panel are not eligible for any of the awards.

*Instrumental Categories.  Winners in the guitar, harmonica, piano/keyboards, horn, drum, and bass categories are not open for public vote. Instrumental or “craft” categories are determined by a panel of experts drawn from the nominating panel.

The awards program is proudly organized by the Toronto Blues Society. 

MAPLE BLUES AWARDS CHANGES

Toronto Blues Society has been receiving valuable input from the members of the Canadian blues community regarding the Maple Blues Awards procedures and voting, and as such, have been developing new policies and protocol to ensure the Maple Blues Award system is responsive and evolving, thanks to the feedback gathered from across Canada. Please note the following changes:

• Nominating Panel Changes: Each year, Toronto Blues Society reviews and assesses the members of the nominating panel for the Maple Blues Awards. This year there have been significant new additions to the panel from many different facets of the national blues scene. For the current list of panel members please scroll down.
• Musician Advisory Committee: This year Toronto Blues Society has a Musician Advisory Committee commenting on the submitted from the nominating panel. This addition to the procedure is intended to inform and guide the results of the final nominee list, ensuring that new and and notable names in Canadian blues are included in the ballot.
• Songwriter Of The Year Category: Changes to this category have been made to ensure that the nominated artist(s) has contributed 50% or more towards the song writing on the recent album to be eligible in this category.
• Social Media Advertising Banned: While getting nominated for a Maple Blues Award is a wonderful achievement and excitement, not all of the nominees are regular users of social media or some may not have the budgets to execute a successful advertising campaign to solicit votes. In the pursuit of fairness for all of the nominees and transparency, social media advertising by the MBA nominees will now be banned during the public voting period for the 23rd annual Maple Blues Awards.

INTRODUCING THE SAPPHIRE VIDEO AWARD

Artists are encouraged to submit their blues music videos for the inaugural the Sapphire Video Award. Sapphire has one single category and both live performance and staged production/interpretive videos will be accepted for the competition. All blues related videos and songs that are exploring the edges of the genre are encouraged to submit. For a full list of criteria and to submit, click here. The Sapphire Video Award winner will be announced at the Maple Blues Awards gala. The award will be presented to both the Artist/Band and the Director of the winning video. The winning artist or group will receive a cash prize of $1,500 (CAD). Each of the two runners up will receive $250 (CAD).

MAPLE BLUES AWARDS APPLICATION PROCESS

There is no application process for the Maple Blues Awards. Nominations are drawn from the expertise of the MBA Nominating Panel. Members of the nominating panel are required to be familiar with Canadian blues artist activity and CD releases. Artists are encouraged to service new releases to all blues radio DJs, journalists and industry professionals across Canada to increase their national profile.

Recording/Producer Of The Year. Nominated recordings in this category must be released during the eligibility period: September 1, 2018 to September 30, 2019.

New Artist Or Group Of The Year. Group or individual, new to the national blues scene, who has made considerable advances artistically and/or commercially over the previous year. The nominee should be performing under its/his/her name on a regular basis and must not have been nominated in any Maple Blues Awards category previously. The award recognizes the group or individual.

LOOKING BACK: 22nd ANNUAL MAPLE BLUES AWARDS

The 22nd Annual Maple Blues Awards took place on Monday, February 4, 2019, at Koerner Hall in Toronto.

Some of the best in Canadian Blues were honoured with Maple Blues Awards at the near sold-out 22nd annual Maple Blues Awards on Monday, February 4 at Koerner Hall. Hosted by popular theatre/television actor and blues artist Raoul Bhaneja (of Raoul and The Big Time) along with the The Maple Blues Band, the audience was treated to sizzling performances by Edmonton expat Jenie Thai, Newfoundland’s Earle & Coffin, Ottawa’s Sue Foley (now based in Austin), and Toronto-based guitarist and singer Emily Burgess. Salt Spring Island’s Harry Manx teamed up with MonkeyJunk’s Steve Marriner to preview their new release and Raoul closed the show with the Big Time joined by surprise guest and big winner Colin James for the finale.

Performances from the night and the show are available at TBS Youtube channel.

Click here to see photos from the magical evening:

*Photo credits: Greg King

Photo Gallery

MAPLES BLUES AWARDS NOMINATING PANEL

The Nominating Panel consists of industry professionals from across Canada who volunteer their time to participate.

*The panel is led by a steering committee consisting of John Valenteyn, Brant Zwicker, Yanick Theriault and Terry Parsons.