NZ music awards set for live telecast

The Vodafone New Zealand Music Awards will, for the first time, be broadcast live on TV3, giving them its biggest audience ever. It is not known at this stage if an Australian channel will run excerpts of it.

The awards, celebrating their 50th anniversary this year, are held at Auckland’s Vector Arena on Thursday November 19.

CEO of Recorded Music NZ Damian Vaughan said, “We’re enormously excited to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Vodafone NZ Music Awards. In half a century, we’ve seen Ray Columbus and the Invaders win the Golden Disc in 1965 with Till We Kissed to Lorde winning Best Single for Team in 2014.

“We’ve recognised some excellent Kiwi music in the past and 2015 is shaping up to be no different. This is certainly one of the strongest years for local releases we’ve ever had.”

Award winning film director, writer, actor and comedian Taika Waititi (pictured) returns from Hawaii, where he is directing his latest film, to host the show.

Finalists for the technical awards are announced on Thursday October 1.

The winners of these awards are unveiled on Tuesday October 13, along with the Legacy award recipient and Critics’ Choice line-up. The Critics Choice winner is made public on Thursday November 5.

Earlier this year, Recorded Music New Zealand revealed that the New Zealand music market was worth NZ$66.2 million in 2014, down from $72.2 million in 2012. The split was $21.4 million from CDs and vinyl, $19.1 million from digital, $12.7 million from streaming and $13 million from public performance and broadcast.

In the last available figures, PC estimated it contributed $204.7 million to the New Zealand economy in 2013 and created the equivalent of 4077 full time jobs.