The awards, which recognise the venues, festivals, promoters and crews shaping Ireland\u2019s live music landscape, were presented at a ceremony in the Guinness Storehouse on Wednesday 21 April, hosted by Tom Dunne and Rachel Mae Hannon.<\/p>\n
The Spirit Store on Georges Quay was named the winner of both Leinster Venue of the Year and Venue Technical Crew of the Year.<\/p>\n
This is a major coup for the venue which celebrated its 25th anniversary last year and which welcomes big name stars such as Paul Young and The Frames to its stage as well as young up and coming musicians.<\/p>\n
Hundreds of venues across Ireland qualified for the awards and IMRO members were invited to nominate their top choices in an online poll. Judging criteria covering ambience, staging, sound and lighting facilities, diversity of music programming, accessibility for people with disabilities, venue staff and management, and the work they undertake in promoting the venue and its programme of music events.<\/p>\n
Sharing news of their wins on social media, the Spirit Store said\u2019A massive thank you to all our staff and crew, all the artists who grace our stages, and to all of you, the punters who show up time and time again.\u2019<\/p>\n
Dundalk\u2019s boutique music and arts festival, Aurfest was named Small Music Festival of the Year, marking a major early success for the independent festival ahead of its second outing this July.<\/p>\n
For a small, independently run festival, the win marks a significant moment and highlights the growing cultural and economic importance of regional festivals across Ireland.<\/p>\n
Set within the beautiful grounds of Bellurgan Park, Aurfest was founded by a collective of Dundalk-based musicians, comedians and event professionals.<\/p>\n
A delighted Sonya Larrigan, one of the Aurfest co-founders, said:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are absolutely thrilled to win the IMRO Small Music Festival of the Year Award. It\u2019s incredible recognition, especially as this is only our second year. We\u2019re so grateful to IMRO, and everyone who supported the festival, from the team behind the scenes to the artists who performed last year. We\u2019re putting just as much love into this year\u2019s event and can\u2019t wait to welcome people back.\u201d<\/p>\n
The festival, which brings together music, comedy, DJ sets and storytelling, with a focus on showcasing homegrown artists and creating a genuinely intimate experience, returns this July.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The awards, which recognise the venues, festivals, promoters and crews shaping Ireland\u2019s live music landscape, were presented at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":409358,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[156,157,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-409357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409357\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/409358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}