Here are all the background details of the Awards, comprising the nomination, voting and awards processes.
Please note these processes refer to the latest Awards year. Previous Awards were mostly the same except for some differences in Awards categories.
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FULL RULES
The nomination, voting and award process will be managed by the Board of the UKBlues Federation and overseen by an external scrutineer.
The Awards year – the qualifying period – will run from 1st January 2020 to 31st December 2020 both days included. The Awards will be presented at an exclusive ceremony to be held in May 2021.
Definition of Blues: Any attempt to define this genre will always be a matter of opinion, individual taste and something of an ever moving target so, if a band, artist, act, songwriter or album meets the nominator’s definition of ‘Blues’, then they are invited to nominate them.
Eligibility: All nominees must be UK nationals normally residing in the UK or non-UK nationals whose normal place of residence is in the UK. For the purposes of these Awards, anyone spending more than six months in the UK in the Awards year is deemed to be residing in the UK.
Definitions of Award Categories:
Blues Artist of the Year
A UK blues artist who, during the Awards year, has made the most significant impact through the quality of his/her performance and/or recordings.
Blues Instrumentalist of the Year
A UK blues instrumentalist who, during the Awards year, has made the most significant impact through the quality of his/her performance and/or recordings.
Blues Band of the Year
A UK blues band that, during the Awards year, has made the most significant impact through the quality of their performance and/or recordings.
Acoustic Blues Act of the Year
An UK acoustic act that, during the Awards year, has made the most significant impact through the quality of his/her/their performance and/or recordings.
Jules Fothergill Young Blues Artist of the Year
A UK artist aged under 25 on the 31st December of the Awards year who, during the Awards year, has made the most significant impact through the quality of his/her performance and/or recordings.
International Blues Artist/Band of the Year
A blues artist or band from outside the UK who, during the Awards year, has made the most significant impact through the quality of his/her/their performance and/or recordings.
Emerging Artist(s) of the Year
A UK blues artist(e), duo or band– for whom this year has seen a significant raising of their profile, experience and presence on the UK blues scene.
Blues Album of the Year
A blues-based album (7 tracks or more) by a UK band/artist(e) first released during the Awards year.
Blues ‘Unsung Hero’ Award
Recognising those who work tirelessly behind the scenes and out of the spotlight, promoting, encouraging, supporting, facilitating and nurturing the blues in the UK
Blues Based Festival or Online Event of the Year
The UK Festival or Event – live or virtual – which, in the Awards year, best catered for the attendees, was well organised and priced and offered the broadest choice of blues-based acts.
Dave Raven UK Blues Based Broadcaster of the Year
A person or persons who produce/present regular (at least once per calendar month) blues-based radio shows, podcasts and the like which emanate from the UK.
Most Inspirational Online Performance of the Year
The most inspirational, emotional and/or moving use of virtual media for a musical performance in the blues sphere
Most Innovative Use of Virtual Media of the Year
The most innovative and unique use of virtual media to provide entertainment, education, information in the blues arena during the pandemic.
Notes on nomination process
All categories will be open to anyone on the nomination panel to nominate other than the following:
Blues Unsung Hero of the Year – The winner of this award will be chosen by the members of the Board of the UKBlues Federation.
International Blues Artist/Band of the Year – The winner of this award will be chosen by the members of the Board of the UKBlues Federation plus a representative of the Award sponsor.
UKBlues Hall of Fame
Any person, act, band, venue, festival or other entity which is declared the winner of a particular category in the UKBlues Awards three times will be entered into the UKBlues Hall of Fame and will no longer be eligible for selection in that particular category.
Nomination Process:
The nomination process will take place between 6th & 20th January 2021.
Except as more specifically detailed above, the first stage of the process will comprise a nomination panel comprising more than 900 people from across the blues spectrum in the UK, being invited to select up to three UK based artists(es), acts, bands for each public award category.
The panel members will be asked to submit their choices in order of preference (first, second, third) with points being awarded according to the position in which the acts are placed by the panel members.
The five acts accumulating the most points for each of the categories will be selected as category finalists and will be entered in a poll comprising the second and final stage of selection – the public voting process. (See below)
The national panel will comprise all current members of UKBlues Federation as at the commencement date of the nomination process, all UK based Active Members of the European Blues Union as at the commencement date of the nomination process and journalists, (both online and print media), broadcasters, promoters, publishers, musicians, festival and club organisers, academics, publicists, agents and label and distribution company personnel, fans and blues supporters and the like.
All members of the nomination panel are required to keep their involvement in the panel confidential. If the UKBlues Federation becomes aware of any member of the nominating panel ignoring this requirement, that person will be removed from the nomination panel and any nominations they may have made will be disallowed.
To avoid any possible conflict of interest, panellists are asked not to nominate artists in whom they have a close professional interest. Managers, agents, publicists or members of staff of record labels/companies should not nominate any artist(s) that they represent.
Voting Process:
Voting will take place during the ‘voting period’ – 1st to 15th February 2021 both days included.
Voting in all categories will be open to any person who votes via the voting mechanism set up by the UKBlues Federation details of which will be available on the UKBlues Awards website – www.ukbluesawards.com – and validated by the UKBlues Federation prior to the closing date of voting.
N.B. Votes submitted which are not accompanied by the full personal details requested at the beginning of the voting page will be discounted. These details will not be used for any purpose other than the security of the voting process and to confirm the eligibility of the voters. All details will be discarded after the voting process has ended. All information provided will be managed in strict accordance with the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).
Voters may only vote for one nominee in each category and may only vote once in each category.
Eligibility: Anybody seeking to vote in the UKBlues Awards must be a UK national whose place of residence is in the UK or a non-UK national whose place of residence is in the UK. For the purposes of these Awards, anyone spending more than six months in the UK in the Awards year is deemed to be residing in the UK.
Votes may be cast in any or all categories in any one session. If voters wish to vote in different categories during different voting sessions they may but all votes must be cast within the specified voting period and must be submitted. Any votes cast outside the voting period or not correctly submitted will not be counted.
To seek to ensure a fair and balanced voting process, all voters will be required to vote in a minimum of five of the award categories. Voters are also encouraged to submit a minimum of two nominees per category, preferably three.
The UKBlues Federation reserves the right to disallow votes from voters who have not complied with these requirements.
Logs of all voting activity will be recorded and monitored. Any party identified as having voted or sought to vote more than once will be barred from voting completely (for this and all future awards) and their vote(s) will be discarded.
In the event of there being any contradiction or lack of clarity in these rules, any dispute about the interpretation or application thereof or any other matter upon which a ruling or interpretation is necessary, the Board of the UKBlues Federation will be the final arbiters and point of reference and they will, after proper consideration and investigation, make a decision, as a Board, and such decision shall be final and binding upon all parties.
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