By Dessa Bayrock (The Cascade) – Email
So what are these Juno Awards, anyway?
For starters, the often all-capped “JUNO” doesn’t actually stand for anything. The awards are named after Pierre Juneau, who was the first president of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (more fondly known as the CRTC, the star of many lower-level MACS courses). He was also the president of the CBC at one point. Basically, this fellow is the king of Canadian media. He was a driving force behind stuff like Can-Con, making sure a certain amount of Canadian music makes it onto the radio and a certain amount of Canadian shows make it onto networks.
A variety of groups have organized the JUNOs over time. The shindig got started in 1970, when the magazine RPM turned their annual list of best-selling Canadian albums into a full-blown awards show. It was renamed the Junos in 1971, and a panel joined the process to decide awards unrelated to how well the artists or albums sold.
This year there are 44 awards up for grabs, including Adult Contemporary Album of the Year, Breakthrough Artist of the Year, and ranging to the most-coveted Artist of the Year, Group of the Year and Album of the Year.
The big show will be on CTV this Sunday, and you’ll be able to find Cascade updates as they happen on Twitter through @YoDessa, since I’m live on location.
