The local music community\u2019s biggest event of the year, the San Diego Music Awards, takes place on Monday, Oct. 5 at Humphrey\u2019s Concerts by the Bay. Celebrating the best in music from San Diego, winners in 27 categories will be decided, with trophies for everything from Best Jazz to Best World Music. Winners in the artist categories have been selected by the public, while the San Diego Music Academy votes for the album categories. 2015 marks the 25th anniversary of the SDMAs, so event organizer Kevin Hellman has put together an impressive lineup that will feature performers from throughout the awards’ history, including legendary saxophonist and now Rolling Stones sideman Karl Denson, reggae favorites Big Mountain, acoustic troubadour Gregory Page & His Accompanists, indie combo Louis XIV, The B-Side Players, Americana quartet Berkley, Hart, Selis, Twang and up-and-coming singer-songwriter Cody Lovaas. This year\u2019s Lifetime Achievement honoree will be guitarist Peter Sprague. Of course, it\u2019s not all about the fun. Money raised goes to support the San Diego Music Foundation’s Guitars and Banjos for Schools programs. Since the programs began, more than 2,978 instruments have been placed in 85 schools throughout San Diego County by the San Diego Music Foundation, Taylor Guitars and Deering Banjos. “It\u2019s sort of a multitiered event,” Hellman said. “We are shining a spotlight on San Diego\u2019s music scene and honoring some of the area\u2019s finest musicians while also (sponsoring) a great industry mixer and a party. Meanwhile, we are also raising money for a very good cause.” Hellman is happy to be helping aspiring young musicians. “With school funding cutbacks, the arts have taken a big hit at schools, and this is a way of bringing some of that back.”
\nFor many local artists, the event\u2019s highlight is the camaraderie. “We noticed a lot of our friends got into many different categories this year,” said Lety Beers, drummer for Schizophonics (nominated for Best Hard Rock Band). “For me, it shows that the community is paying attention to all the things that are going on musically, whether it’s new stuff like Birdy Bardot’s project and The Bassics or seeing bands like Deep Sea Thunderbeast and The Loons, who have been around for a while. It’s a fun scene to be in and see it keep charging up.” Lindsay Matheson, of indie rockers Flaggs (Best Alternative Band and Best Live Band) agrees. “We are nominated with a lot of our friends’ bands in the same category,” she said. “I don’t really view these things as a competitive thing. The awards are a fun place to see everyone in one spot, have drinks and reminisce about past shows.” Will Lerner, of Shake Before Us (Best Alternative Band), concurs. “Some of the other artists are our close friends and comrades,” he said. “I do think there’s camaraderie in the music community, I see it all the time in the respect and love we show each other. I think we all realize that supporting each other enhances everyone in the scene. There’s really no reason to be divided or petty.”
\nLaura Levenhagen, of Le Chateau (Best New Artist), considers the band interaction to be important. “We’ve developed some strong ties with other bands we’ve played with, and sometimes we’ll go out and support them and vice versa,” she said. “I’d say there’s a pretty strong sense of camaraderie in the music scene here \u2013 and everyone seems to know everyone!” Ultimately, though, for musicians, the awards are validation for their hard work. Pianist Danny Green is nominated in three categories this year (Best Jazz, Best Jazz Album and Album of the Year), and he notes the awards are a great showcase for area musicians. “It feels great to have my work recognized, and, if nothing else, hopefully these nominations help introduce my music to people who haven\u2019t heard of me yet,” he remarked. “It has served as kind of a wake-up call\/confirmation that what we\u2019re doing is being well received,” said KI singer Kiley Halpern, “because it\u2019s really not about the award \u2013 more so when we found out about the nomination it just made us feel great to know that people are loving what we\u2019re doing! We work night and day on it because it\u2019s our passion.”
\nand seeing how it\u2019s paying off is really cool. The recognition and reassurance goes hand in hand with creating and inspiring more creation. “As an artist, that reassurance is always a plus and a beautiful thing to experience. It\u2019s an honor to be recognized by a local organization that\u2019s uplifting the San Diego community.” “(It\u2019s) definitely a plus,” said Kendrick Dial of hip-hop combo Lyrical Groove (Best Hip-Hop), “because there is a level of notoriety that comes along with it, and it definitely does a little something for the confidence as well as how others view us.”<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The local music community\u2019s biggest event of the year, the San Diego Music Awards, takes place on Monday, Oct. 5 at Humphrey\u2019s Concerts by the Bay. Celebrating the best in music from San Diego, winners in 27 categories will be decided, with trophies for everything from Best Jazz to Best World Music. Winners in the […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":257670,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11561","_seopress_titles_title":"San Diego Music Awards to feature the best bands and performers","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11549,11561],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-257669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-entertainment","category-peninsula-beacon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/257669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=257669"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/257669\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/257670"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=257669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=257669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=257669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}