The launch of the South African Music Awards (SAMA25) was a star-studded affair. On Thursday evening, the country's cream of the crop made their way to the nominee event in Alberton, Johannesburg, to find out who was in line to be awarded for their outstanding musical works.
As reported by IOL News, the return to Alberton, 25 years later, was symbolic of the reflective times South Africans are in.
SAMA25 returns to its roots Looking back at a quarter of a century since the first SAMA event was held in the same town, one can see the strides that have been made by our creatives in reshaping the sound of Africa.
This was the tone that reverberated through the walls of the Alberton Civic Centre.
Alex Sekati, the director of the department of arts and culture in the North West, teased that a bigger budget injection into the event would make this the most magnificent SAMA's we have ever seen.
The legacy programme that we are leaving behind is such that we cannot live without, even after our association comes to an end, because all association come to an end whether we die We want to believe that the legacy that shall be left by this arrangement or partnership shall be forever, he said.
Black Coffee receives five nominations It came as no surprise that one of the hardest working, internationally-lauded artists in South Africa, led the pack with the most nominations on the evening.
Black Coffee spends more time scaling the decks of the most iconic venues in the world than any other urban musician in South Africa.
How he still finds the time to be at the forefront of reshaping the house genre with more Black Coffee teases new music with Kelly Rowland is baffling.
Alas, the turntable maestro received five nominations, with his latest project Music is King, scoring him a place in the coveted Album of the Year, Artist of the Year, and Best Dance Album categories.
He also took up two places in the Collaboration of the Year category, increasing his chances of walking away with something on the night.
The SAMA25 event will be held at the Sun City resort on Friday, 31 May.
Here is a full list of the nominations:
SAMA25: Full list of nominations Everybody served HEAT this past year, but we are honoured to announce the following as our #SAMA25 Album of The Year Nominees! pic.twitter.com/EbM64g9Q2f
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 We were never ready for the talent these stars brought in 2018 These are the #SAMA25 Duo/Group of the Year nominees! pic.twitter.com/O6prCundMg
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 Time stands still when you're surrounded by the right melodies. Congratulations to these incredible artists for making it as our #SAMA25 Best Produced Album nominees pic.twitter.com/pVOJTiH5nc
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 FIRE ALERT! THIS IS NOT A DRILL
We are proud to announce these music maestros as nominees for #SAMA25 Remix of the Year! pic.twitter.com/CuKRquJ0FA
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 AYEYE, this list is filled with the best talent South Africa has to offer! Congratulations to all our #SAMA25 Nominees for killing the game. pic.twitter.com/TAYhdBXxvO
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 Kuyafiwa with these guys Check out the heavy hitters in the music industry are going toe to toe on our #SAMA25 Male Artist of the Year nominee list! pic.twitter.com/AHnsd5AsSu
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 Nishayile ladies! We are proud to announce these songbirds as our #SAMA25 Female Artist of the Year nominees! pic.twitter.com/QfVgLQ8fR1
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 There's nothing as powerful as music coming to life through video! That's why we're honoured to announce these groundbreakers as #SAMA25 Music Video of the Year nominees pic.twitter.com/bazjy0HDGc
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 When you come together and be all about the music, all you can do is WIN. Congratulations to these artists on their #SAMA25 nomination for Collaboration of the Year! pic.twitter.com/oFlh5lQjq6
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 To the #SAMA25 Best Live Audio Visual Recording nominees, thanks for making us feel like we are right there with you in the crowd! pic.twitter.com/yfgJGFND2E
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 Nothing short of phenomenal! Congratulations to our #SAMA25 Best Afro Pop nominees! We see you shining pic.twitter.com/pBpa8rojCn
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 A huge shoutout to these jazz legends in the making for coming out on top in our #SAMA25 Best Jazz Album nominees list! pic.twitter.com/KjU6gXnWQY
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 2018 was a year that kept on giving us the best music Africa has to offer. Competition was tight, but these are the stars of our #SAMA25 Rest Of Africa Artist nominees list pic.twitter.com/YMllFHTFuJ
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 Siyalilizela for our #SAMA25 Best Maskandi Album nominees! Congratulations! pic.twitter.com/T0xuRDVhUN
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 To our #SAMA25 Best Traditional Album nominees, we thank you for giving us melodies that keep taking us back to our roots! pic.twitter.com/3u6hNp0zCB
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 Congratulations to these #SAMA25 Best African Indigenous Faith Album nominees for bringing the melodies of faith to us like we've never seen before! pic.twitter.com/1RprHpSewg
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 These nominees has all the artists who kept us raising our voices to the heavens! Congratulations to our #SAMA25 Contemporary Faith Music Album nominees pic.twitter.com/2WNAELJgTD
The SA Music Awards (@TheSAMAs) April 25, 2019 These nominees has
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
The launch of the South African Music Awards (SAMA25) was a star-studded affair. On Thursday evening, the country's cream of the crop made their way to the nominee event in Alberton, Johannesburg, to find out who was in line to be awarded for their outstanding musical works.
