Sam Fender has handed over the entirety of his twenty-five thousand pound honor winnings to the MVT, which works to save the United Kingdom's grassroots concert spaces.
Fender was presented with the cheque on October 16 as his latest record the album was chosen as the top album of the past year.
He has decided to donate the funds to the trust, in recognition of the vital role local spots had in his beginning days.
"As an artist couldn't be pursuing this success if it weren't for all the performances I performed around the North East, and beyond, when I was starting out," remarked the artist. "These locations are iconic, but they are facing challenges."
Since the start of 2023, over 150 of these spaces have ceased operations – roughly 16 percent of the entire UK sector.
In the last year, major artists such as Pulp, the group Coldplay, Katy Perry and Ed Sheeran have all aided the MVT in its initiatives to help venues survive, by applying a modest fee to their ticket costs, which benefits local stages.
Fender also participated, generating more than £100,000 on his recent tour to help numerous grassroots venues across Britain.
These funds supported locations that were dealing with potential shutdown due to issues stemming from floods, fires and bereavements, as well as licensing issues, conflicts and sound issues.
Other venues received funding support in modernizing amenities and sound and lighting systems that directly benefitted artists and concertgoers.
"The notion that revenue from concerts in big venues supports the local stages, where it kicks off for musicians like me, is just logical," Sam Fender has commented.
The musician is among several artists to contribute his award prize money to charitable organizations.
In they received the award in 1996 for their record their work, frontman Cocker declared that the act would contribute their cash to the organization War Child.
In 2002, musician the artist shared her prize among a few good causes, including the NSPCC and a charity for Sickle Cell.
"I also contributed a thousand pounds to my local community centre, to their gymnastics program, because I trained in gymnastics when I was growing up and they required better apparatus," Ms Dynamite shared with the media.
In recent years, the band donated their prize money to the community center that supported their group, as well as other grassroots music organisations.
And the 1994 recipients they donated their award to a charity for MS after a friend was diagnosed the illness.
"Receiving the award was quite enough," stated vocalist Heather Small. "The prize was the bonus but we could do without the bonus, because we had the main prize. So our winning touched the lives of others."
Last week, the MVT shared it had rescued a couple of local spots in the South East, by transferring them to public stewardship.
The Joiners in that area and the second in the city were purchased under the Own Our Venues initiative, which is backed by Arts Council England and enthusiasts who buy "stakes" in the properties.
