Juno Award

The Juno Awards are presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music. New members of the Canadian Music Hall of Fame are also inducted as part of the awards ceremonies.

Winners are currently chosen by either members of the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences or a panel of experts depending on the award. 9 out of 42 categories are based solely on sales figures, such as Album of the Year or Artist of the Year. Nominees are determined by CARAS members for Single of the Year, Artist and Group of the Year. Nominees are determined by a judge vote for the remaining categories who are experts in the relevant genre. The list of confidential judges are composed of experts in each specific genre of music. These judges represent all facets of the Canadian music industry, are spread across the country, and a mixture of males and females in both official languages. No person can judge the same category two years in a row.

Shawn Mendes

Shawn Peter Raul Mendes (born August 8, 1998) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. He attracted a following in 2013, when he began posting song covers on the popular video sharing application Vine. The following year, he caught the attention of artist manager Andrew Gertler and Island Records A&R Ziggy Chareton, which led to him signing a deal with the record label. Mendes went on to release an EP and his debut studio album Handwritten, whose single "Stitches" reached the top 10 in the U.S. and Canada, and number one in the UK.

Early life

Mendes was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and was raised in Pickering, a suburb of the city. He is the son of Karen, a real estate agent, and Manuel Mendes, a businessman, selling bar and restaurant supplies in Toronto. His father is Portuguese (from Algarve), while his mother is English. He attended Pine Ridge Secondary School in Pickering, Ontario.

Career

2014–present: Handwritten

He first started posting cover videos on the popular social video app Vine in 2013 and picked up millions of views and followers in a matter of months, becoming well known for his six-second snippets of renditions of many popular songs. By August 2014, he was the third most-followed musician on Vine. Artist manager Andrew Gertler discovered Mendes online in January 2014, bringing him to Island Records where he eventually signed and released his first single "Life of the Party" in June 2014. He is the youngest artist to debut in the top 25 with a debut song on the Billboard Hot 100, making to number 24 for the week ending July 12, 2014, at 15 years, 11 months and 4 days of age.

Award

An award is something given to a person, a group of people, or an organization to recognize their excellence in a certain field; a certificate of excellence. Awards are often signified by trophies, titles, certificates, commemorative plaques, medals, badges, pins, or ribbons. An award may carry a monetary prize given to the recipient; for example, the Nobel Prize for contributions to society or the Pulitzer Prize for literary achievements. An award may also simply be a public acknowledgment of excellence, without any tangible token or prize.

Overview

Awards can be given by any person or institution, although the prestige of an award usually depends on the status of the awarder. Usually, awards are given by an organization of some sort, or by the office of an official within an organization or government. For instance, a special presidential citation (as given by the President of the United States) is a public announcement giving an official place of honor (e.g., President Ronald Reagan gave a special presidential citation in 1984 to the Disney Channel for its excellent children's television programming.)

Alessia Cara

Alessia Caracciolo (Italian pronunciation: [aˈlɛssja kaˈrattʃolo]; born July 11, 1996), better known as Alessia Cara, is a Canadian singer and songwriter. She is signed to EP Entertainment and Def Jam Recordings and is best known for "Here", her debut single from her debut album, Know-It-All, released November 13, 2015. A sleeper hit, the song reached the top 5 in the United States and the top 20 in Canada. Prior to her work with EP and Def Jam, Cara was known for her acoustic song covers on YouTube.

Early life

Alessia Caracciolo, known as Alessia Cara, was born in Brampton, Ontario, Canada, a city just outside Toronto, where she attended Cardinal Ambrozic Catholic Secondary School. She is of Italian descent from Calabria; her father was born in Canada, to Italian parents, and her mother is an Italian immigrant. As a child, she wrote poetry and did theatre. At the age of 10 she began playing guitar and taught herself how to play various songs. At the age of 13 she began her own YouTube channel where she posted covers of songs that she performed.

Red carpet

A red carpet is traditionally used to mark the route taken by heads of state on ceremonial and formal occasions, and has in recent decades been extended to use by VIPs and celebrities at formal events.

History

The earliest known reference to walking a red carpet in literature is in the play Agamemnon by Aeschylus, written in 458 BC. When the title character returns from Troy, he is greeted by his vengeful wife Clytemnestra who offers him a red path to walk upon:

Agamemnon, knowing that only gods walk on such luxury, responds with trepidation:

Oriental carpets in Renaissance painting often show rugs and carpets, patterned but with red often the main background colour, laid on the steps to a throne, or on a dais where rulers or sacred figures are placed.

A red carpet was rolled out to a river to welcome the arrival of United States president James Monroe in 1821. In 1902, The New York Central Railroad used plush crimson carpets to direct people as they boarded their 20th Century Limited passenger train. This is believed to be the origin of the phrase "red-carpet treatment". Film premieres are often laid down with red carpets.