Meteor Choice Music Prize
By Greg Synnott
It’s time for the Choice Music Prize once again. This year judges will be zoning in on the best Irish albums from 2011 with a slight twist: Meteor, the sponsors of the prize, have introduced the song of the year category, decided by the public through text voting to 085711444 or on the Meteor Facebook page.
This year the ceremony takes place at The Olympia Theatre on Thursday 8th March with all 10 bands performing live. Tickets for the show are on sale for €22.50 and can be bought exclusively from Ticketmaster.ie. You could also be one of the lucky winners on Meteor’s Facebook Page, where they are holding daily competitions.
The 10 bands will be hoping to walk away with the €10,000 cash prize decided by 11 industry experts
The prize was established in 2005 to highlight those albums “which deserve some extra time in the spotlight and, ultimately, to select the album which best sums up the year in Irish music,” the organisers say.
“The ethos behind the prize is to stimulate debate and interest in Irish artists and Irish Music and to increase public awareness of music from Ireland annually.”
The shortlist for Irish Album of The Year is:
The shortlist for Irish Song of The Year is