Monday night at Bell Media’s Masonic Temple, Concert Hall Studios in Toronto a gala concert was held to celebrate the 2012 Polaris Music Prize Short List and announce the winner of the prestigious prize.
Short list nominees, Cadence Weapon, Cold Specks, Kathleen Edwards, Fucked Up, Grimes and Yamantaka // Sonic Titan performed for the live and streaming audience.
The Polaris Prize is presented annually to the best Canadian album of the year based on “artistic merit without regard to genre, sales history or label affiliation”. This year’s Grand Jury of 11 music media professionals; Gregory Adams (Georgia Straight), Michael Barclay (Maclean’s, Radio Free Canuckistan), Chris Bilton (The Grid), Ryan Bresee (CKCU 93.1fm), Lisa Christiansen (CBC Radio 1), Shawn Conner (The Snipe News), Melissa Hetu (TFO), Kevin Laforest (Freelance, ex-Hour), Ryan B. Patrick (Freelance), Tabassum Siddiqui (Freelance) and Nicole Villeneuve (AUX TV) came from the original Polaris jury of 200 Canadian writers, editors, broadcasters and DJs. The 11 jurists were tasked with selecting the winner from the 10 short list nominees and Feist’s Metals came out on top. Members of 2011 Polaris Prize winners Arcade Fire made the announcement and presented Feist with her $30,000 award. All other nominees received $2000 for making the Polaris Short List.
Highlights from Monday night’s gala, hosted by CBC Radio 3’s Grant Lawrence and MuchMusic’s Lauren Toyota will be telecast September 29th on MuchMusic.
Tim Kingsbury and Jeremy Gara of Arcade Fire present Feist with the 2012 Polaris Prize