The BRIT Awards (often simply called the BRITs) are the
British Phonographic Industry
British Phonographic Industry (BPI) is the British recorded music industry's Trade association. It runs the BRIT Awards, the Classic BRIT Awards, National Album Day, is home to the Mercury Prize, and co-owns the Official Charts Company with ...
's annual
popular music
Popular music is music with wide appeal that is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no musical training.Popular Music. (2015). ''Fun ...
awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain", or "Britannia" (in the early days the awards were sponsored by
Britannia Music Club Britannia Music Club (19692007) was a British mail-order company owned by PolyGram which sponsored the Brit Awards. The company was acquired by Universal Music Group as part of PolyGram in 1998, and closed in 2007. The direct marketing format was to ...
), but subsequently became a
backronym
A backronym is an acronym formed from an already existing word by expanding its letters into the words of a phrase. Backronyms may be invented with either serious or humorous intent, or they may be a type of false etymology or folk etymology. The ...
for British Record Industry Trusts Show. In addition, an equivalent awards ceremony for classical music, called the
Classic BRIT Awards
The Classic BRIT Awards (previously Classical BRIT Awards) are an annual awards ceremony held in the United Kingdom covering aspects of classical and crossover music, and are the equivalent of popular music's Brit Awards. The awards are organi ...
, is held in May. The awards were first held in 1977 and originated as an annual event in 1982 under the auspices of the British record industry's trade association, the
BPI. In 1989, they were renamed The BRIT Awards.
Mastercard has been the long-term sponsor of the event.
The highest profile music awards ceremony in the UK, the BRIT Awards have featured some of the most notable events in British popular culture, such as the final public appearance of
Freddie Mercury, the
Jarvis Cocker
Jarvis Branson Cocker (born 19 September 1963) is an English musician and radio presenter. As the founder, frontman, lyricist and only consistent member of the band Pulp, he became a figurehead of the Britpop genre of the mid-1990s. Following P ...
protest against
Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. Over a ...
, the height of a
high-profile feud between
Oasis and fellow
Britpop
Britpop was a mid-1990s British-based music culture movement that emphasised Britishness. It produced brighter, catchier alternative rock, partly in reaction to the popularity of the darker lyrical themes of the US-led grunge music and to the ...
band
Blur, the
Union Jack dress
The Union Jack dress is an item of clothing worn by singer Geri Halliwell of the Spice Girls at the 1997 Brit Awards. The mini dress featured a flag of the United Kingdom, the Union Jack, on the front, and a white CND symbol emblazoned on th ...
worn by
Geri Halliwell
Geraldine Estelle Horner (née Halliwell; born 6 August 1972) is an English singer, songwriter, author, and actress. She rose to prominence in the 1990s as Ginger Spice, a member of the girl group the Spice Girls. With over 100 million records ...
of the
Spice Girls, and a
Chumbawamba member throwing a bucket of iced water over then-Deputy Prime Minister
John Prescott
John Leslie Prescott, Baron Prescott (born 31 May 1938) is a British politician who served as Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and as First Secretary of State from 2001 to 2007. A member of the Labour Party, he w ...
.
These moments took place in the 1990s when the ceremony had a reputation for being “a little shambolic, unpredictable and, at times, anarchic” with a criticism it has lost its edge since then and “evolved into a more polished, sanitised affair.”
The BRIT Awards were broadcast live until 1989, when
Samantha Fox
Samantha Karen Fox (born 15 April 1966) is an English pop singer and former glamour model from East London. She rose to public attention aged 16, when her mother entered her photographs in an amateur modelling contest run by ''The Sunday Peopl ...
and
Mick Fleetwood
Michael John Kells Fleetwood (born 24 June 1947) is a British musician, songwriter and occasional actor. He is best known as the drummer, co-founder, and leader of the rock band Fleetwood Mac. Fleetwood, whose surname was merged with that of t ...
hosted a widely criticised show in which little went as rehearsed.
From 1990 to 2006, the event was recorded and broadcast the following night. From 2007, The BRIT Awards reverted to a live broadcast on British television, on 14 February on
ITV
ITV or iTV may refer to:
ITV
*Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of:
** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...
.
That year, comedian
Russell Brand was the host and three awards were dropped from the ceremony:
British Rock Act,
British Urban Act and
British Pop Act.
["2007 Brits to be broadcast live"](_blank)
BBC. Retrieved 23 November 2012 For the last time, on 16 February 2010,
Earls Court
Earl's Court is a district of Kensington in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in West London, bordering the rail tracks of the West London line and District line that separate it from the ancient borough of Fulham to the west, the ...
in London was the venue for The BRITs. The BRIT Awards were held at
the O2 Arena in London for the first time in 2011.
The BRIT Award statuette given to the winners features
Britannia
Britannia () is the national personification of Britain as a helmeted female warrior holding a trident and shield. An image first used in classical antiquity, the Latin ''Britannia'' was the name variously applied to the British Isles, Great ...
, the female personification of Britain. Since 2011, the statuette has been regularly redesigned by some of the best known British designers, stylists and artists, including
Vivienne Westwood
Dame Vivienne Isabel Westwood (née Swire; born 8 April 1941) is an English fashion designer and businesswoman, largely responsible for bringing modern punk and new wave fashions into the mainstream.
Westwood came to public notice when she m ...
,
Damien Hirst
Damien Steven Hirst (; né
Brennan; born 7 June 1965) is an English artist, entrepreneur, and art collector. He is one of the Young British Artists (YBAs) who dominated the art scene in the UK during the 1990s. He is reportedly the United Kingd ...
,
Tracey Emin
Tracey Karima Emin, CBE, RA (; born 3 July 1963) is a British artist known for her autobiographical and confessional artwork. Emin produces work in a variety of media including drawing, painting, sculpture, film, photography, neon text and ...
,
Peter Blake,
Zaha Hadid
Dame Zaha Mohammad Hadid ( ar, زها حديد ''Zahā Ḥadīd''; 31 October 1950 – 31 March 2016) was an Iraqi-British architect, artist and designer, recognised as a major figure in architecture of the late 20th and early 21st centu ...
,
Anish Kapoor
Sir Anish Mikhail Kapoor (born 12 March 1954) is a British-Indian sculptor specializing in installation art and conceptual art. Born in Mumbai, Kapoor attended the elite all-boys Indian boarding school The Doon School, before moving to the UK t ...
and
David Adjaye
Sir David Frank Adjaye (born 22 September 1966) is a Ghanaian-British architect. He is known for having designed many notable buildings around the world, including the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D. ...
. In 1992,
KLF opened the show and invited extreme metal band
Extreme Noise Terror
Extreme Noise Terror (often abbreviated to ENT) are a British extreme metal band formed in Ipswich, England in 1985 and one of the earliest and most influential crust bands. Noted for one of the earliest uses of dual vocalists in hardcore,Bon ...
on stage, complete with flame-throwers, and fired machine gun blanks over the crowd. The group sent a dead sheep to the aftershow party, and later buried their BRIT Award statuette at
Stonehenge
Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England, west of Amesbury. It consists of an outer ring of vertical sarsen standing stones, each around high, wide, and weighing around 25 tons, topped by connectin ...
signifying their abhorrence of the music industry.
Robbie Williams
Robert Peter Williams (born 13 February 1974) is an English singer and songwriter. He found fame as a member of the pop group Take That from 1990 to 1995, and achieved commercial success after launching a solo career in 1996. His debut stud ...
holds the record for the most BRIT Awards, 13 as a solo artist and another five as part of
Take That
Take That are an English pop group formed in Manchester in 1990. The group currently consists of Gary Barlow, Howard Donald and Mark Owen. The original line-up also featured Jason Orange and Robbie Williams. Barlow is the group's lead singe ...
. Girl group
Little Mix
Little Mix are a British girl group, composed of group members Leigh-Anne Pinnock, Jade Thirlwall, and Perrie Edwards. Jesy Nelson was originally part of the group before she left in 2020. After becoming the first group to win the British ver ...
made history at the
Brit Awards 2021
Brit Awards 2021, the 41st edition of the annual Brit Awards, was the UK's first major indoor live music event in more than a year. It was held on 11 May 2021 and celebrated the best in British and international music. Usually held in February, ...
, when they became the first female group to receive the award for Best Group at the ceremony after 43 years since it was first introduced.
Ceremonies
The first awards ceremony was in 1977, as "The BRITish Record Industry BRITannia Awards", to mark the
Queen
Queen or QUEEN may refer to:
Monarchy
* Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom
** List of queens regnant
* Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king
* Queen dowager, the widow of a king
* Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mother ...
's
Silver Jubilee and was televised by
Thames Television
Thames Television, commonly simplified to just Thames, was a franchise holder for a region of the British ITV television network serving London and surrounding areas from 30 July 1968 until the night of 31 December 1992.
Thames Television broa ...
. There has been an annual ceremony since 1982.
The 1988 BPI Awards was the first of the ceremonies to be broadcast on
live television
Live television is a television production broadcast in real-time, as events happen, in the present. In a secondary meaning, it may refer to streaming television over the Internet when content or programming is played continuously (not on demand) ...
. The
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
had previously broadcast the ceremony from 1985, with the shows from 1982 to 1984 not broadcast on television. The BBC continued to broadcast the renamed BRIT Awards, live in 1989 and pre-recorded from 1990 to 1992.
have broadcast the awards since 1993, pre-recorded until 2006 and live from 2007 onwards.
has provided backstage radio coverage since 2008.
Since 2014, ITV have aired a launch show in January titled ''The BRITs Are Coming'', which reveals some of the artists who have been nominated at the upcoming ceremony. The first host was
in 2016.
hosted ''The BRITs Are Coming'' in 2017 and again in 2018 when it was broadcast live for the first time.
hosted in 2020. Amfo later returned and was joined by
as co-host in December 2021.
The 2023 edition will take place on 11 February 2023 and it will be held for the first time on Saturday since its formation in 1977.
. Ceremonies were not held from 1978 to 1981, and at first were not televised after resuming in 1982.
...