 Media release 30 April 2020 Record number of entries showcase outstanding year for Pacific music Announcing the finalists for the 2020 Pacific Music Awards Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, there’s plenty to celebrate in New Zealand’s Pacific music scene. The finalists for the 2020 Pacific Music Awards were announced today after a record number of entries, resulting in 24 finalists across 13 categories. Pacific Music Awards Trust spokesperson Rev. Mua Strickson-Pua said that despite the challenging situation we find ourselves in, it’s more important than ever to celebrate the successes of our artists. “The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has been felt, even by our humble 2020 Pacific Music Awards, requiring us to navigate through these times of uncertainty and great sadness. We acknowledge our traditional role and contribution to uplift the spirit and well-being of our people. “We also take on the challenge of navigating the new economic reality and technology opportunities for our awards. Today we’re immensely proud to recognise this year’s finalists, who are exciting new and seasoned Pacific artists, that are making waves and taking Pacific music to new heights and realities. ” Leading the finalists are hip hop duo Church & AP who are the fresh faces behind the next wave of New Zealand and Pacific hip hop. After being nominated for Best Hip Hop Album at the Vodafone New Zealand Music Awards in 2019, they released their debut album Teeth the following day on 15 November. Since then, they’ve been nominated for four Pacific Music Awards including Flava Best Pacific Group, Base FM NZ & Island Base Samoa Best Pacific Hip Hop Artist, Best Producer and Recorded Music NZ Best Pacific Music Album. Alongside Church & AP, international Pacific star Olivia Foa’i is also in the running for four Pacific Music Awards. As the lead female singer and dancer for multi-award winning Polynesian band Te Vaka, she’s seen success for her contributions to Disney’s Moana soundtrack alongside her father Opetaia Foa’i, who received the Special Recognition Award for his contributions to the film at the 2017 Pacific Music Awards. She released her debut solo album Candid in 2019 and has been nominated for Auckland Council Best Pacific Female Artist, SunPix Best Pacific Language, Best Producer (with her brother Matatia) and Recorded Music NZ Best Pacific Music Album. Hip hop artist commonly referred to as ‘Poly Pac’ (in reference to West Cost hip hop legend Tupac Shakur), Poetik achieved huge success with his album HAMOFIED 2 EP last year and has been nominated for three awards at the 2020 Pacific Music Awards – NZ Music Commission Best Pacific Male Artist, Base FM NZ & Island Base Samoa Best Pacific Hip Hop Artist and Recorded Music NZ Best Pacific Music Album. In a Pacific Music Awards first, Shepherds Reign are the first Polynesian heavy metal group to be nominated as finalists. They’re up for Flava Best Pacific Group, SunPix Best Pacific Language and APRA Best Pacific Song for their single ‘Le Manu’ is inspired by the legend of an ancient Samoan warrior and is quite possibly the first heavy metal song sung in the Samoan language. Recipients of the 2018 Manukau Institute of Technology Lifetime Achievement Award Punialava’a are back this year, proving their staying power as icons of the Pacific music community. This year they’re nominated for both PMN Best Pacific Gospel Artist and SunPix Best Pacific Language for the album Sili’aga I Fa’atufugaga, Beyond Our Stories. Having carved a place for herself within Auckland’s vibrant music community over the past six years as a proud, second generation Samoan New Zealander, Lou’ana’s voice carries the stature of an old soul. She released her debut solo material in 2019, is nominated for Auckland Council Best Pacific Female Artist, Best Pacific Soul/R&B Artist and NZ On Air Best Pacific Music Video, and has plans to release her first album this year. Both Noah Slee and Lepani are nominated for Best Pacific Soul/R&B Artist, as well as NZ Music Commission Best Pacific Male Artist, while rapper Melodownz is nominated for Base FM NZ & Island Base Samoa Best Pacific Hip Hop Artist for his song ‘No Mercy’ featuring American rapper Denzel Curry. Other finalists include Lani Alo (SunPix Best Pacific Language, PMN Best Pacific Gospel Artist, APRA Best Pacific Song), Tomorrow People (Flava Best Pacific Group, Pato Entertainment Best Pacific Roots/Reggae Artist), General Fiyah (Pato Entertainment Best Pacific Roots/Reggae Artist, APRA Best Pacific Song), Bella Kalolo (Auckland Council Best Pacific Female Artist), JXN (PMN Best Pacific Gospel Artist), Jordan Gavet (Best Pacific Soul/R&B Artist), Lomez Brown (Pato Entertainment Best Pacific Roots/Reggae Artist), Raggadat Cris (Pato Entertainment Best Pacific Roots/Reggae Artist), Disciple Pati (NZ On Air Best Pacific Music Video), SWIDT (NZ On Air Best Pacific Music Video), KINGS (Best Producer), Mikey Mayz (Best Producer), HP Boyz (PMN Best International Pacific Artist), Josh Tatofi (PMN Best International Pacific Artist) and Kaiit (PMN Best International Pacific Artist). There will be six other awards announced for the 2020 Pacific Music Awards: Phillip Fuemana Most Promising Pacific Artist, NZ On Air Radio Airplay Award, NZ On Air Streaming Award, SunPix People’s Choice Award – Best Pacific Artist, Special Recognition Award and the Manukau Institute of Technology Lifetime Achievement Award. The winner of the Recorded Music NZ Best Pacific Music Album category is presented with an official Tui and recognised at the Vodafone New Zealand Music Awards later this year. Pacific Music Awards finalists: Auckland Council Best Pacific Female Artist:
NZ Music Commission Best Pacific Male Artist:
Flava Best Pacific Group:
NZ On Air Best Pacific Music Video:
APRA Best Pacific Song:
SunPix Best Pacific Language:
Base FM NZ & Island Base FM Samoa Best Pacific Hip Hop Artist:
Best Pacific Soul/R&B Artist:
Pato Entertainment Best Pacific Roots/Reggae Artist:
PMN Best Pacific Gospel Artist:
PMN Best International Pacific Artist:
Recorded Music NZ Best Pacific Music Album:
Best Producer
All the artist finalists:
For more information: www.pacificmusicawards.org.nz Issued for the Pacific Music Awards by Pead PR About the Pacific Music Awards: In 2004 the Pacific Music Awards Committee (PMAC) was formed to realise a vision and the inaugural Pacific Music Awards debuted at Pasifika Festival in March 2005. Encouraged by the success of the awards the PMAC set about developing an annual event as a significant highlight of the New Zealand music industry calendar. The awards committee formed a Charitable Trust to organise and host the awards, and are driven by a simple core objective: to create and manage an event that acknowledges the success of Pacific artists, celebrates and promotes excellence in Pacific music and encourages young Pacific musicians to aspire to a higher level of achievement. Contact: Rachel Weiss, Pead PR | 021 066 2791 | E. [email protected] Adam Warin, Pead PR | 021 029 01388 | E. [email protected]
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 Sharing the next update, from the music industry organisations, with our Pacific music community to keep you informed and connected:
COVID-19: MUSIC SECTOR REQUEST TO GOVERNMENT Recorded Music NZ has led the contemporary music sector in a request to government for assistance in light of the impact of covid-19. The request was sent to government on 17th April on behalf of Recorded Music NZ, APRA AMCOS, NZ Promoters Association, MMF and IMNZ. They have asked government for a number of measures for immediate assistance, and further measures to assist the industry with recovery and return to productivity in the coming months and years ahead. Our request to government is summarised below For the full details and to download the document as a pdf – go here: https://www.recordedmusic.co.nz/covid-19-music-sector-request-to-government/ FINANCIAL AND ACCOUNTING SERVICES HELPLINE – FREE TO APRA MEMBERS APRA have announced a new service provided by Entertainment Accounting, connecting APRA members, for free, to a senior accountant for a 20 minute phone call. Lynda Parsons, Jeni Rowney, and Natallia Ramanchuk will be able to assist you with any questions you have about income and COVID-19 grants, particularly at this time, and how these may affect you in terms of taxation or other accountancy purposes. All phone calls will be treated as completely confidential. If you would like to utilise this service and book in a time for a phone call, please contact Gabe Andrews (APRA Member Services), by emailing [email protected], with ‘Accounting Services Helpline’ in the subject line. Please include your full name and membership number, and if possible, a short summary of the questions you’d like to ask, or issues you need help with – this way the accountants can be prepared when they speak to you. There will be up to nine slots available per week, beginning next week (from April 28). Thanks go to to Entertainment Accounting (https://www.entertainmentaccounting.co.nz/) for providing this service. INDUSTRY HUI #2 & RADIO HUI If you missed the 2nd industry music industry hui, you can catch up now on the MMF YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-jaF1cTbVvgOKpLabk-8OA) page. The next iteration of the collective music industry huis will specifically focus on radio, with Recorded Music's own Paul Kennedy (Radioscope) and NZ On Air's David Ridler talking to programmers from ZM, The Rock, More FM, Mai FM George FM and 95bFM. 11:00am, Thursday 30 April. Check our events page on Facebook for details. TAITE MUSIC PRIZE Mark the date! The Taite Music Prize will take place on Tuesday 5th May, and you can watch the live stream via Recorded Music NZ's Facebook page. As the Founding Partner, Recorded Music is once again pleased to be providing the winners' cheque of $12,500. Alongside the main Taite Music Prize, winners of the Auckland Live Best Independent Debut, Independent Music NZ Classic Record and the Independent Spirit Award will also be announced with award acceptances via the live stream.  Here is the next update, from the music industry organisations – sharing with our Pacific community to keep you informed and connected: Financial assistance available We want to make sure everyone knows about the financial assistance available to them in these challenging times. Below is a round up of info, eligibility, what you get, and links to apply for the WINZ government subsidy, the Creative NZ Emergency Relief Grant, and the MusicHelps Emergency Grant. Two particular things to note: 1) The Creative NZ grant is open to a wide variety of ‘arts practitioners’, which includes not only the ‘artists’ themselves, but also those who are involved in bringing those art forms to the public, whose main source of income is derived from an arts practice. So this could include musicians and songwriters, as well as producers, engineers, managers, live crew, stage managers, publicists etc. Please check out the info from Creative NZ, and contact them if you’re not sure about your eligibility. 2) The MusicHelps Emergency Grant is officially open for applications, but due to the large volume of applications received this morning, they have temporarily stopped taking applications while this first batch are processed. The application form will be live again at 5pm today. https://apraamcos.co.nz/news/2020/april/financial-assistance-during-covid-19/ There was also an excellent financial and accounting advice online seminar hosted by MMF NZ with Jeni Rowney from Entertainment Accounting last week. They provided advice and answers to questions about the various grants, and their tax implications , as well as sharing general advice about your accounting practices as artists. You can watch the video back here: https://www.facebook.com/MMFNewZealand/videos/153361826094012/?epa=SEARCH_BOX Recorded Music NZ Distribution And on the subject of paperwork, Recorded Music NZ is calling all Direct-to-Recording Artist Registered Artists and Labels to make sure they have registered all new recordings released in 2019 with Recorded Music NZ prior to the deadline of 30th April 2020 for the 2019 calendar year distribution. This is more important than ever as it will assist Recorded Music to make an accurate and timely distribution. To register your recordings please do this by visiting your Recorded Music artist login page or contacting their member services team by email. Government announces Tax Changes to Support NZ Business The Government announced a further set of tax proposals to help businesses manage the impacts of COVID-19. Some of this information may be of assistance to you and your music business. Fact sheets and the full Government announcement is here. NZ Music Month – it’s happening NZ Music Month kicks off on Friday, May 1st and the theme for this year is simple: Support Local. Stream Local. Follow Local. Buy Local. This May marks the twentieth NZ Music Month, and while a big month of live events and retrospection was planned, the world has changed a lot in the past month – so NZ Music Month 2020 is set to look a little different to usual. Initiatives planned for NZ Music Month 2020 range from digitally streamed events, radio specials, online seminars and hui. Plans include live-streams to showcase emerging talent; IMNZ’s Going Local series; MMF NZ’s annual NZ Music Month Summit; NZ music specials across a variety of radio stations; a Holiday Records competition to be the first 7 inch pressed in NZ since 1987; and many virtual festivals. Check out more info here: https://www.nzmusic.org.nz/news/commission/nz-music-month-2020-its-on-the-way/  The Pacific Music Awards Trust are very happy to confirm that the online Finalist Announcement, for the 2020 Pacific Music Awards, will take place on Wednesday 29 April at 7pm.
We are looking forward to sharing this great news and to celebrate our amazing Pacific artists and their music. We acknowledge the important role that music plays in our lives, to connect and uplift us - especially now, as we collectively navigate this uncertain time together. As previously announced we will not host the awards ceremony on 21 May 2020 as planned but continue as many aspects of the awards ceremony as we can. At this time, we are not able to confirm a new date for the 2020 Pacific Music Awards, but our Trust absolutely confirms our commitment to honouring and celebrating Pacific music. The Pacific Music Awards Trust will announce a decision about the awards ceremony when we can and wants to continue to support our Pacific artists and keep our community connected. We will share more details about our 2020 Finalist Announcement with you soon! #PMA2020 |
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