Following a six month nationwide search for the best in young UK musical talent, last night three unsigned artists were crowned winners of Next BRIT Thing - a national music competition for 11-19 year olds backed by the UK music industry, The BRIT Awards and the Government.
Having battled their way through regional auditions after being selected from 2,500 entries in a public online vote, thirteen Next BRIT Thing finalists performed in front of a panel of celebrity judges and an audience of thousands on Monday 5th March 2012 at the IndigO2 in Greenwich, London.
After stiff competition, the judges; pop band McFly, operatic tenor Noah Stewart, best-selling soprano Laura Wright and managing director of Columbia Records Mike Smith, chose winners in three different categories: 19-year old Northern Irish singer-songwriter Paul Shevlin won the General Category with his original melodic piano led songs. This category was open to all genres. Paul wins a recording session at the world-famous Abbey Road.
"I'm really humbled to have been selected from such a standard of artists on the night. Being a massive Beatles fan I cannot wait to get into Abbey Road studios - it's a bit surreal!" said Paul Shevlin.
BPI Chief Executive Geoff Taylor said, “All the performances on the night were truly inspirational, showing the real breadth of musical talent from Britain’s young performers. Paul’s performance was astonishing – a star in the making and a true natural performer. He’s a worthy winner of our first Next BRIT Thing national competition and I look forward to hearing his Abbey Road recording.”
16-year old classical piano player Sarah Gardner from Stockton-on-Tees near Middlesborough won the Classical Category. As a prize she will get to perform at the Royal Albert Hall as part of Classic FM’s Autumn Concert, recorded for broadcast.
Laura Wright congratulated Sarah, “The whole event was fantastic, there was an incredible amount of talent on stage, not one act let the competition down. Sarah stood out to me as the classical winner immediately. She played with such confidence and composure for someone so young, and her performance of the Ravel was truly breathtaking. I wish her and all the rest of the finalists the best of luck with their future's, it was a joy to be part of The Next Brit Thing!"
"It was an amazing night in front of a fantastic audience with some very tough competition. The opportunity to perform at The Royal Albert Hall is a dream come true for me. All this and I got to meet McFly too." said Sarah Gardner.
South London, female-fronted rock band Floodliners were victorious in the Songwriting Category, sponsored by PRS for Music. They will receive a songwriting session in addition to the share of £10,000-worth of instruments from Roland UK with the other winners.
Guy Fletcher OBE, PRS Chairman said: “Huge congratulations to Floodliners with their excellent track Freeze, worthy winners of the PRS for Music songwriting and composition award. The standard of entries for original works was exceptionally high, demonstrating the wealth of young creative songwriting talent we have in this country. Good luck to them in what I’m sure will be a long and fruitful career in music creation.”
"Last night's show was sick! It was great to perform at such a cool venue with all the other talent and it was brilliant that we won our first ever award! Whoo! Its nice to be recognised for what we love to do!" said Floodliners’ 15 year-old bass player Georgia South.
Launched in Summer 2011, Next BRIT Thing - www.nextbritthing.com - looked for young musicians in any genre to share their performances, compete in online charts and perform live. The competition was open to all 11-19 year olds whether in formal education or not. In all, some 36,000 young people registered to get involved and the website attracted over 100,000 unique users. More than 2,500 entries were made by young people uploading tracks, which were voted upon during a two-month period prior to Christmas 2011. After 60,000 votes were cast, a long list of performers to audition in one of ten regions emerged.
Organised by the BPI, with the support of the record industry and the sponsorship of the Department for Culture, Media and Sports and the Department for Education, Next BRIT Thing has brought together all elements of the industry including artists, labels and industry bodies including the Performing Rights Society and the Music Industries Association and sponsors, Peavey and Roland. It offers young people the opportunity to engage with the music industry, develop their music talent and enjoy the shared experience of being part of a national event.
PRS for Music specifically recognised entrants to Next Brit Thing whose submission either in the pop or classical genre, is an original work. Over a thousand Next Brit Thing entries were original compositions underpinning the vast creative young talent across the UK.
-ends-
NOTES FOR EDITORS:
IMAGES
Images from the Next BRIT Thing final are available here: http://bit.ly/xA4jZH.
General winner Paul Shevlin: http://bit.ly/zlvBep
Classical winner Sarah Gardner: http://bit.ly/w9jShS
PRS For Music Songwriting winners Floodliners: http://bit.ly/xGp75b
About BPI
The BPI is the representative voice of the UK recorded music business. The BPI is a trade organisation funded by its members - which include hundreds of independent music companies and the UK’s four major record labels. The BPI’s members account for approximately 90% of all recorded music sold in the UK, and globally the UK's recorded music market is the fourth biggest.
The BPI also organises the annual BRIT Awards show as well as the Classical BRIT Awards show. The organising company BRIT Awards Limited, is a fully owned subsidiary of the BPI. Substantial proceeds from both shows go to the BRIT Trust, the charitable arm of the BPI that has donated almost £15m to charitable causes nationwide, since its foundation in 1989.
For further information, please contact Adam Liversage on 0780 117 9032 or adam@bpi.co.uk.
About PRS for Music
PRS for Music is home to the world's best music writers, composers and publishers. Formed as The MCPS-PRS Alliance in 1997 with the PRS for Music brand adopted in 2009, the organisation brings together two royalty collection societies; MCPS and PRS. We exist to collect and pay royalties to our members when their music is exploited in one of a number of ways – when it is recorded onto any format and distributed to the public, performed or played in public, broadcast or made publicly available online.
PRS for Music is one of the world’s most efficient combined rights collecting operations. Offering its members more money, more often, at less cost and its customers the most efficient means by which they can use music.
