Brit Awards

The Brit Awards are the annual United Kingdom pop music awards founded by the British Phonographic Industry. The awards began in 1977 as the BPI Awards and were renamed The Britannia Awards, or Brit Awards, in 1989.

Related Topics:
United Kingdom - 1977 - BPI - Britannia - 1989

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Brit is also a backronym for British Record Industry Trust which supports youngsters in the arts and education mainly at the BRIT School in Croydon, London.

Related Topics:
Backronym - Arts - Education - Croydon - London

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Strong music industry sponsorship and involvement mean that awards are given without much democratic process and, many suspect, for strongly commercial reasons. These are awards given by the music industry to the music industry. Robbie Williams pointed this out accepting an award a few years back, and winners over previous years have included artists who haven't charted for some time (the nominations for Best Female Vocalist in 2003 included Alison Moyet, for example, who has not had a chart or album hit for many years). However, more recently the awards have more reflected the tastes of the record buying public with an artist needing to prove popular and chart-topping before they are rewarded.

Related Topics:
Robbie Williams - 2003 - Alison Moyet

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The Brit Awards used to be broadcast live until 1989 when Samantha Fox and Mick Fleetwood hosted a shambolic show in which just about everything went wrong - lines were fluffed, bands mis-cued, and airtime filled with embarrassing silence. After this the show was recorded and broadcast the following night, part of a revamp by Jonathan King for 1990 whose actions also included releasing a megamix of British dance acts including S'Express and A Guy Called Gerald called Brits 1990. King subsequently went on to revamp A Song for Europe.

Related Topics:
1989 - Samantha Fox - Mick Fleetwood - Jonathan King - 1990 - Megamix - S'Express - A Guy Called Gerald - A Song for Europe

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Pre-recording proved to be a good idea when, during a Michael Jackson performance in 1996, Jarvis Cocker from the band Pulp invaded the stage in a comedic protest at Jackson's messianic performance. There have been many such notable instances, including several UK politicians presenting awards and being heckled (and, in the case of John Prescott, having water thrown over him, at the 1998 awards, by Chumbawamba vocalist Danbert Nobacon http://www.spunk.org/library/music/chumba/sp001737/) and a remarkable performance by The KLF in 1992.

Related Topics:
Michael Jackson - 1996 - Jarvis Cocker - Pulp - John Prescott - 1998 - Chumbawamba - Danbert Nobacon - The KLF - 1992

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In addition, an equivalent awards ceremony for classical music, called the Classical Brit Awards, is held each May.

Related Topics:
Classical music - Classical Brit Awards

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In 2004 the controversial move was made to axe the Dance Music category from the 2005 awards.

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