This year’s O2 African Music Awards (AMAs) is ready to take London by storm with its unique blend of African music and culture.  It will be held at Wembley Arena, London on October 15^th and looks set to make major strides towards becoming one of Africa’s premier global events.

With UNICEF UK as a beneficiary, the AMAs is a celebration of African inspired talent and, within its niche, the AMAs will aim to expose the incredible richness of African music and culture, showcasing the breath-taking performances from the Continent’s music giants and top musicians. Music Moguls, Film Legends, Fashion gurus, and Football stars, will all participate in the event’s presentations, making it truly the most glamorous African event in the UK for the year 2010.

Since its successful launch in 2008 the AMAs have become a fixture in the London entertainment calendar and have attracted some of Africa’s best talent from around the world.  The 2009 AMAs was a sell-out success with a worldwide audience of 50 million people and plaudits from everyone who saw the event.

Speaking about this years event founder Eric McKaiser said, “Music industry experts have tipped African music to “explode” into the UK market and the AMAs is there to provide a platform that will recognise their achievements annually.  We want to change the perception of African music as a niche into entertainment that will appeal to the masses”.

With 10 headline acts and 8 representing North, South, East and West Africa, the AMAs will be a vessel to inform people about African tradition and principles and contribute to the vibrant multicultural community in the UK.
The AMAs will also include African Music Unsigned (AM Unsigned), the first national music competition for unsigned artists; bands, vocal groups and solo artists for artists of African origin, providing a great opportunity for people to perform live in front of some of the country’s top producers, Label execs, promoters and DJs to exhibit their musical talent. The winner of the competition will be announced at the AMA’s and given the opportunity to perform at the event, as well as receiving a £50,000 record deal to start them off on their career to stardom.

The launch of this year’s AMAs will take place at the African Centre in Covent Garden on Wednesday 18^th August from 6.30pm and will include some sneak previews of artists due to perform at the Awards.  The launch will introduce the charity single, ‘Africa’, an acapella rendition of the Toto original, performed by Perpetuum Jazzile which will be released in August.  The single will be performed at the AMAs.

David Paich from Toto, who co-wrote the song said, “When I wrote Africa I never dreamed of hearing such an innovative rendition. All I can say is awesome!  I am truly honoured”

10% of this year’s proceeds from the ceremony are going towards supporting UNICEF’s project of helping HIV/Aids Orphans in Africa which works tirelessly to help project a positive face of Africa in London, providing a focal point for all forms of cultural and social activities related to Africa.