PUBLIC VOTING OPENS FOR THE TENTH ANNUAL UK FESTIVAL AWARDS
Fans will officially have their say on this year’s festival season as voting in the UK Festival Awards (UKFA) goes live today at festivalawards.com/vote. UK festivals, from the smallest to the largest, will be hoping to be crowned the best of what this summer had to offer with gongs including Best New, Family and Dance festivals up for grabs. Artists are in the running too with all three Glastonbury headline acts - The Rolling Stones, Artic Monkeys and Mumford & Sons all eager to scoop the Headline Performance of the Year gong. Winners in the tenth anniversary UK Festival Awards will be decided by those who know best, the festival-loving public, at a glitzy award ceremony at London’s legendary Roundhouse on Monday 2nd December 2013.The return of the festival ‘mothership’ that is Glastonbury meant another massive year for the festival industry. The sun shone down on a number of new artists from the guitar-wielding Haim to beat-masters Disclosure and with acts including The 1975 and Kendrick Lamar also making waves this summer competition in the ‘Best Breakthrough Artist’ category is fierce this year. While the new kids on the block battle it out the seasoned pros such as Chic featuring Nile Rodgers will compete against themselves for the title of ‘Anthem of the Summer’ as both ‘Freak Out’ and ‘Get Lucky’, his record-breaking collaboration with Daft Punk, are nominated alongside sing-a-long favourite ‘Hey Ho’ by The Lumineers. And our own overall winner of The Greener Festival Award will be revealed - the greenest of the green here in the UK - last year won by the Croissant Neuf Summer Party - one of a small number of jury awards which include Agency of the Year, The Lifetime Achievement Award and The Promoter of the Year.Also making waves in festival fields this summer was an increasing use of technology, from contactless payments to integrated social media, a development that will be recognised in the UK Festival Awards’ new industry-judged category ‘Best Use of New Technology’.To celebrate the tenth anniversary of the UK Festival Awards, organisers are set to stage an exhibition of festival poster artwork from festivals spanning the past decade, and are proud to announce that critically acclaimed contemporary artist Pete Fowler has been confirmed as curator of the exhibition. A selection of works will be on display at the Roundhouse and auctioned to raise money for Attitude is Everything, the charity which improves access to live music events for deaf and disabled people. To submit artwork from the last 10 years visitfestivalawards.com/apply before October 21.Tickets start at just £40 and are available through the UK Festival Conference & Awards' official ticketing partner Eventbrite, to order please visit festivalawards.com/tickets/.