We had pleasure of attending the Welsh Music Prize courtesy of our friend James Minas (from Noise Culture). What an evening. We felt extremely proud to be Welsh that night, watching performances from so many different Welsh acts. From the melodic and calm Half Happy, to the inspiring and uplifting Mace The Great, to the aggressive punk Minas. The awards ceremony took place in the beautiful Cardiff Millenium Centre, in Cardiff Bay.
For a bit of context, the Welsh Music Prize nominates 15 acts each year who have released an album, equpting them with an award and £10,000 to invest back into their music. We definitely don’t envy the people on the panel that night, who had to choose out of the amazing nominees:
- Cerys Hafana – Edyf (Cerys Hafana / Self Released)
- CVC – Get Real (CVC Recordings)
- Dafydd Owain – Uwch Dros Y Pysgod (Recordiau I KA CHING)
- H Hawkline – Milk For Flowers (Heavenly Recordings)
- Hyll – Sŵn O’r Stafell Arall (Recordiau JigCal Records)
- Ivan Moult – Songs From Severn Grove (Bubblewrap Records)
- John Cale – Mercy (Domino Recording Co Ltd.)
- Mace The Great – SplottWorld (SplottWorld Ent.)
- Minas – All My Love Has Failed Me (Libertino Records)
- Overmono – Good Lies (XL Recordings)
- Rogue Jones – Dos Bebés (Libertino Records)
- Sister Wives – Y Gawres (Libertino Records)
- Stella Donnelly – Flood (Secretly Canadian)
- Sŵnami – Sŵnamii (Recordiau Côsh Records)
- YNYS – Ynys (Libertino Records)
… But luckily, that Welsh Music Prize wasn’t the only award being celebrated last night. The Triskel Award 2023 was given to 3 amazing acts that we had the pleasure of watching perform that night. We were super proud to see our friends from Half Happy take home one of the Triskel Awards, as well as Dom + James, and Talulah. Finally, we saw Rogue Jones take home the Welsh Music Prize with their incredible Welsh folk album Dos Bebés.