The Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) has announced the ‘Michael Gudinski Breakthrough Artist’ award in honour of the late music mogul.
The ‘Breakthrough Artist’ award has existed under many iterations since its debut in 1987. It was later split into two separate awards – ‘Breakthrough Single’ and ‘Breakthrough Album’ – in 1989. Then, in 2010, it was changed back to ‘Best Breakthrough Artist Award’.
The ‘Michael Gudinski Breakthrough Artist’ award will be presented for the first time at the 2021 ARIA Awards.
“In the past few weeks, we have seen an outpouring of love, respect and admiration from so many around the world for the late Michael Gudinski who was a pioneer and true legend that changed the face of the Australian music industry,” said Denis Handlin AO, Chairman of ARIA, in a press statement.
“It is unequivocal that Michael’s passion was breaking Australian artists and putting them on a world stage and he had a proud history of success in doing so.
“Following personally discussing this with Michael’s family, this is the most appropriate honour for ARIA to bestow as it recognises Michael’s profound impact on Australian artists, and the memories and legacy he created.”
The announcement comes the same day as the Victorian State Memorial is set to happen for Gudinski at Rod Laver Arena. The event takes place tonight, and will be live-streamed on YouTube, with proceedings kicking off at 7:07pm AEDT.
Watch the stream below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEvM78BH0-c&ab_channel=mushroomvideos
