In Its Seventh Year, the We Love Christian Music Awards Continues To Evolve
While Nominating 68 Artists in 24 Categories
Returning sponsor Visible Music College prepares to open campus for innovative
Award ceremony in February 2019 as voting opens to public
Boise, Idaho (Dec.3, 2018) — Public voting for the We Love Christian Music Awards is now open as the most innovative and inclusive awards cycle kicks off for the seventh year in a row.
The awards—presented by the largest Christian music site online, NewReleaseToday.com, and sponsored exclusively by returning partner, Visible Music College —highlights the best Christian music released in 2018.
for KING & COUNTRY, Lauren Daigle and Phil Wickham lead the way with five nominations each, meeting together in the highly competitive Album of the Year category. Sarah Reeves, Jordan Feliz and LEDGER gathered four nominations each. Michael W. Smith, Steffany Gretzinger, Hillsong Worship, Elevation Worship and Austin French all received three nominations.
In total, 68 artists were nominated in 23 categories, with more than a third of those artists not signed to a traditional label deal—a statistic that continues to set the We Love Awards apart from any other award cycle in the Christian music industry.
“Since inception, the We Love Awards have proudly celebrated artists from every corner,” says NewReleaseToday and We Love Awards founder, Kevin McNeese. “The independent music scene continues to produce some of the best music of the year and deserves to be part of the conversation.”
New this year is the expansion of genre specific song categories including Contemporary, Worship, Pop and Rock Song of the Year. For the first time, the Song of the Year category has been blown wide open with a write-in fan vote replacing the traditional list of five nominees.
Also added is a category that celebrates the non-stop success of worship anthem “Reckless Love” by Cory Asbury. Artists have released dozens of covers and this year’s Best “Reckless Love” Cover category seeks to find the one that has most resonated with fans. Anthem Lights, Israel Houghton, Michael W. Smith, Passion feat. Melodie Malone and VERSES will vie for the one-time only category.
The seventh annual awards welcomes returning partner Visible Music College, which trains and releases worship leaders, musicians, producers and managers for the Church and music industry across multiple global campuses. The expanded partnership will include a special Winner Announcement Event planned for Tuesday, February 26, 2019 from the college’s anchor campus in Memphis, TN that will be broadcast on Facebook Live.
Visible Music College President Ken Steorts, a founding member of Platinum-selling rock band Skillet, sees the expanding partnership as a natural fit: “Visible Music College appreciates the vision of NewReleaseToday and the We Love Christian Music Awards for the broad range of nominees, the depth of care of the music and the artists, and the unique and global distribution of the voting base and awards show presentation. We love Christian music and we love being a global and education partner with NRT and the WLA show!”
Voting is now open at www.weloveawards.com, where fans can pick their favorites in 24 categories as many times as they want between now and Friday, Jan. 25, 2019. Voters will be entered to win multiple prizes as well as a special Christmas song download from Visible for early voters in December.
Learn more about the We Love Christian Music Awards, view the full list of nominees and vote at http://www.weloveawards.com.
