This year marks the 46th annual JUNO awards and will be broadcasted from the Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa, Ontario on Sunday, April 2nd. What began as an award ceremony to celebrates canadian media arts professionals in all categories has become a weeklong festival across the country. For Canada’s 150th’ anniversary most of the events will be taking place in the nation’s capitol with JUNO related events sprinkled across various cities. On Thursday, March 23rd, The Ontario Media Development Corporation hosted a red carpet event at One King West Hotel in Toronto.
Nominees in attendance included Tim Macmillar of Protest The Hero, Blitz//Berlin, Paul Reddick, Ammoye, Exco Levi, Diana Panton, Matt Dusk, Jay Kartier, Shiranthra Beddage, The Strumbellas, Daniel Taylor with Members of the Trinity Choir, Okavango Africa Orchestra, Florence K, Turkwaz, Luke Doucet of Whitehorse, Max and Nick of The Arkells, Eric Ratz and Splash N’ Boots. Other notaries in attendance were Allan Reid, President and CEO at The Canadian Academy of Recording Arts (CARAS) & Mark Cohon, Karen Thorne-Stone, President and CEO of OMDC, Mark Sakamoto Chair of the OMDC Board of Directors, Han Dong, Member of Provincial Parliament and Neill Dixon, President of CMW.
After a few words from Karen Thorne-Stone she introduced MPP, Han Dong who expressed his excitement that the festival and award ceremony were back in Ontario this year. The next speaker was Mark Sakamoto, the Chair of OMDC’s board of directors who began his career hawking t-shirts and hanging out with roadies, not an ideal life for a twelve year old he jokes but says he’s proud to be from a place with such unparallelled rising talent. The last speaker of the evening was Allan Reid who made a quick toast to the nominees in the room, congratulating them on their success thus far and nomination. Having been in the business now for 25 years, Reid says the greatest part about the JUNOS is celebrating all the amazing talent across all genres of music and that’s what these awards and festival is all about. He name drops some of Canada’s rising and biggest stars like Justin Bieber, The Wknd, Drake, The Arkells, The Strumbellas, etc. It sure is a great year for Canadian music.
In Canada’s 150th year, only the third time in 46 years the JUNOS will be in Ottawa. Although some events have already begun, the bulk of events begin Thursday March 30th, 2017 starting with the JUNO Cup Jam, March 31st holds a celebrity fundraising hockey game, as well as a two night music festival Friday March 31st and Saturday April 1st. You can check out a complete listing of events as well as the nominations at junoawards.ca. The JUNOs will be held Sunday April 2nd beginning at 6:30 PM EST on CTV.
