| 12th Canadian Folk Music Awards | |
|---|---|
| Date | December 3, 2016 |
| Location | Isabel Bader Theatre, Toronto, Ontario |
| Country | Canada |
| Website | folkawards.ca |
The 12th Canadian Folk Music Awards were presented in Toronto, Ontario on December 3, 2016. [1]
Recipients are listed first and highlighted in boldface.
| Traditional Album | Contemporary Album |
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| Children's Album | Traditional Singer |
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| Contemporary Singer | Instrumental Solo Artist |
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| Instrumental Group | English Songwriter |
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| French Songwriter | Aboriginal Songwriter |
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| Vocal Group | Ensemble |
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| Solo Artist | World Solo Artist |
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| World Group | New/Emerging Artist |
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| Producer | Pushing the Boundaries |
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| Young Performer | |
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Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted orally, music with unknown composers, music that is played on traditional instruments, music about cultural or national identity, music that changes between generations, music associated with a people's folklore, or music performed by custom over a long period of time. It has been contrasted with commercial and classical styles. The term originated in the 19th century, but folk music extends beyond that.
Stanley Allison Rogers was a Canadian folk musician and songwriter.
Gordon Meredith Lightfoot Jr. is a Canadian singer-songwriter and guitarist who achieved international success in folk, folk-rock, and country music. He is credited with helping to define the folk-pop sound of the 1960s and 1970s. He is often referred to as Canada's greatest songwriter and is known internationally as a folk-rock legend. Lightfoot's biographer Nicholas Jennings said "His name is synonymous with timeless songs about trains and shipwrecks, rivers and highways, lovers and loneliness. He is unquestionably Canada's greatest songwriter."
Spirit of the West were a Canadian folk rock band from North Vancouver, active from 1983 to 2016. They were popular on the Canadian folk music scene in the 1980s before evolving a blend of hard rock, Britpop, and Celtic folk influences which made them one of Canada's most successful alternative rock acts in the 1990s.
William Joel MacDonald Plaskett is a Canadian rock musician and songwriter based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He was a member of Halifax alternative rock band Thrush Hermit in the 1990s. Plaskett performs in a number of genres, from blues and folk to hard rock, country, and pop.
David Francey is a Canadian folk singer-songwriter. He is the recipient of three Juno Awards and three Canadian Folk Music Awards.
Danny Michel is a Canadian songwriter and producer.
Americana is an amalgam of American music formed by the confluence of the shared and varied traditions that make up the musical ethos of the United States, specifically those sounds that are emerged from the Southern United States such as folk, gospel, blues, country, jazz, rhythm and blues, rock and roll, bluegrass, and other external influences. Americana, as defined by the Americana Music Association (AMA), is "contemporary music that incorporates elements of various American roots music styles, including country, roots-rock, folk, bluegrass, R&B and blues, resulting in a distinctive roots-oriented sound that lives in a world apart from the pure forms of the genres upon which it may draw. While acoustic instruments are often present and vital, Americana also often uses a full electric band."
RPM was a Canadian music-industry publication that featured song and album charts for Canada. The publication was founded by Walt Grealis in February 1964, supported through its existence by record label owner Stan Klees. RPM ceased publication in November 2000.
David Myles is a Canadian songwriter and musician born in Fredericton, New Brunswick. Myles lives in Fredericton New Brunswick, as of September 2020, moving from Halifax, Nova Scotia. His music has often been labeled folk jazz, although he prefers simply to call it "roots" music. An independent artist who self-releases his albums, Myles has been able to gain an increasingly large audience, in part because of his active touring schedule and in part because of his cross-genre musical collaborations, which include a single made with the rapper Classified that became the biggest-selling rap single in the history of Canadian music.
Joel Fafard is a Canadian finger-style and slide guitarist from Saskatchewan. He now lives on the Sunshine Coast in British Columbia.
The Canadian Folk Music Awards are an annual music awards ceremony presenting awards in a variety of categories for achievements in both traditional and contemporary folk music, and other roots music genres, by Canadian musicians. The awards program was created in 2005 by a group of independent label representatives, folk music presenters, artists, and enthusiasts to celebrate and promote Canadian folk music.
Sultans of String are an instrumental music group based in Toronto, Ontario, combining elements of Spanish flamenco, Arabic folk, Cuban rhythms, and French Manouche Gypsy-jazz. The group's leader is producer and Canadian musician Chris McKhool. At the core of Sultans of String's musical vision is the belief that societies derive strength from diversity, and that common ground can be found amidst one's differences.
Canadian folk music has a long history, dating from the 16th and 17th century, mostly derived from the music of early settlers; much earlier for the music of indigenous people. Folk music thus differentiates between traditional and contemporary. Many of Canada's most influential folk artists emerged in the contemporary folk music era, notably Bruce Cockburn, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Ferron, Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell, Kate & Anna McGarrigle, Leonard Cohen, Murray McLauchlan, Stan Rogers, Valdy, Penny Lang, The Rankin Family and Wade Hemsworth. In the 1970s, chansonniers grew steadily less popular with the encroachment of popular rock bands and other artists, and many of the folk clubs, such as the Montreal Folk Workshop, and groups such as The Raftsmen, the Mountain City Four and, eventually, The Travellers, that had served to foster the mid-20th century revival closed down. Some new performers did emerge, however, including Jacques Michel, Claude Dubois, and Robert Charlebois. The Canadian Folk Music Awards are presented annually to musicians carrying on in the tradition.
Don Amero is a Canadian country and folk singer-songwriter from Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Pharis and Jason Romero are a Canadian folk music duo, most noted as three-time Juno Award winners for Traditional Roots Album of the Year. They won the award at the Juno Awards of 2021 for their album Bet On Love, the Juno Awards of 2016 for their album A Wanderer I'll Stay, and at the Juno Awards of 2018 for Sweet Old Religion.
The Jerry Cans are a band from Iqaluit, Nunavut who combine traditional Inuit throat singing with folk music and country rock. Their music is largely written in Inuktitut, the indigenous language of the Inuit people, with lyrics which "reflect the challenges and beauty of life in the Far North". Their 2016 album, Inuusiq/Life, was released on Aakuluk Music, Nunavut's first record label, which the band's members established in 2016 "to support Inuit and Indigenous musicians".
William Prince is a Canadian folk and country singer-songwriter based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, who won the Juno Award for Contemporary Roots Album of the Year at the Juno Awards of 2017 for his debut album Earthly Days. He performs as a solo artist and alongside Vince Fontaine and Don Amero in the band Indian City.
Gina Lam, better known by her stage name Ginalina, is a Canadian family folk singer and songwriter, based in Vancouver. She released her first children's album, Sandcastle Magic, in 2012, which won a 2013 Parents' Choice Award: Silver Honour Award. Her following album, Forest Friends' Nature Club was released in 2015 and was nominated for a Juno Award and for a 2015 Canadian Folk Music Award, as well as winning a 2016 Parents' Choice Award: Silver Honour Award. In 2016, she released Home is Family which won the Children's Artist of the Year category at the Western Canadian Music Awards, a 2017 Parents' Choice Award: Gold Honour Award. This album was nominated for the 2017 Canadian Folk Music Awards in the category: Children’s Album of the Year. In 2018, Ginalina released her fourth album, entitled "It Takes a Village". It was selected as a nominee for the 2019 Juno Award in the category of Children's Album of the Year, and nominated for Children’s Album of the Year in the 2020 Canadian Folk Music Awards.
Twin Flames is a Canadian band from Ottawa, Ontario led by husband and wife Jaaji and Chelsey June, whose music blends both First Nations and Inuit music with folk rock. They have toured extensively across Canada, remote Arctic communities, Greenland, France, Australia, and the United States.
