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IT'S AWARDS SEASON IN BLIGHTY

Many music industry success stories were celebrated in London town Wednesday night at the Q Awards and inaugural A&R Awards, where former Island Records and Sony/CBS exec Muff Winwood (pictured) was the night's star honouree.

David Joseph’s Universal scored a home run at the Q Awards, with eight acts taking home prizes. Those were James Bay and Bastille (Virgin EMI), Jack Garratt, U2 and PJ Harvey (Island), M.I.A. and The 1975 (Polydor) and Madness (Universal). Max Lousada’s Warner was honoured once with Muse, while The CharlatansTellin’ Stories, released via indie Beggars, was named Classic Album. Veteran acts Meat Loaf, Ray Davies, The Edge and Blondie were also celebrated.

Secondary ticketing website StubHub sponsored the event, which wasn’t money well spent as Bastille, Bay and Garratt criticised the operation during their acceptance speeches, sparking a host of headlines. Still, no such thing as bad press, right?

On a different side of town, The A&R Awards celebrated the talent of those working in artist development. The ceremony’s first ever edition honoured veteran A&R man Winwood as the A&R Icon. The exec, who worked with The Clash, Dire Straits, Jamiroquai, George Michael and many more, was welcomed to the stage with a very warm speech from Capitol Records U.K. boss Nick Raphael, who spoke of Winwood’s careful and measured approach.

Blur man Damon Albarn, pictured at left, took what one can only assume was an industrial strength cocktail of Jägermeister and MDMA before awarding Mike Smith, who is now MD of Warner/Chappell U.K., the Sir George Martin Award. Craig David, on the other hand, appeared clean as a whistle during a moving speech about his longtime manager and motivator Colin Lester of JEM Artists, who was given the Artist Loyalty Award.

Ben Cook’s Atlantic got the Breakthrough Artist Award for Jess Glynne, while A&R of the Year in the Electronic/Dance category went to David Dollimore and Dipesh Parmar of Ministry of Sound.

The 1975 manager Jamie Oborne (Dirty Hit) was A&R of the Year Rock/Alternative,Tim Blacksmith and Danny D were celebrated in the Pop/R&B category, as was Warner/Chappell’s Amber Davis for Hip-Hop/Grime.

Indie label of the year was Emmanuel de Buretel and Jane Third’s Because Music and Ben Mortimer and Tom March’s Polydor got Major Label of the Year (the duo gave a shout out to their predecessor, Ferdy Unger-Hamilton, who recently defected to Sony).

Adele manager Jonathan Dickins accepted the Management Company gong for September while Publishers of the Year were Guy Moot’s Sony/ATV and Christian Tattersfield’s Good Soldier Songs. The Breaking Artist Award went to indie act Gavin James, who’s published by Tattersfield.

Producer of the Year was Mark Ralph (Years & Years, Kygo) and Songwriter of the year was Cass Lowe (Sony/ATV), while A&R Administrator went to Ashley Forbes of Virgin EMI.

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