Music Week Awards launches in "special year".

The 2009 Music Week Awards officially launches today (Monday) with a number of sponsors already signed up for the event.

The prestigious annual ceremony will move from its traditional slot on a Thursday evening and will take place next year on Wednesday, April 8, at London's Grosvenor House Hotel.

Six months prior to the main ceremony being held, MW can already announce that Delga Press, Nielsen Music Control, Peacock, PPL and Skyskraper have signed up as sponsors. They are backing what will be a particularly special awards ceremony as it will occur in what will be the 50th anniversary year of the magazine.

In total there will be 26 categories being contested at the event, including old favourites such as the A&R award, Record Company of the Year and The Strat, which was won last year by EMI's former UK & Ireland chairman and CEO Tony Wadsworth, who is presently BPI chairman.

Several other categories are being added this year, including Music Retail Brand of the Year, which will be open to any music retail brand/chain operating either on the high street, online or both, and selling physical or digital product or both.

The Music Retail Brand award will run alongside the Music Retail Store category, which was introduced at the 2008 event and was won in its first year by Rough Trade East. This category will again be open to stores that are either independent or part of a chain but all information supplied must relate to one individual outlet.

In both retail categories the judges will be looking for evidence of strong customer service, product knowledge, product range and store innovations.