Many of Canada’s brightest music stars will descend on Winnipeg for the Juno Awards in 2027.

The city was announced on Thursday as host for the 56th annual celebration of Canada’s music industry. The multi-day fest will take place from April 1-4, 2027, culminating in awards gala at Canada Life Centre, broadcast live on CBC.

It will be the third time Winnipeg has welcomed the event, considered to be the equivalent of the U.S. Grammy Awards.

The Junos previously held them in 2005 with comedian Brent Butt as host, and in 2014 when the show was helmed by a trio of musicians: Serena Ryder, Classified, and Johnny Reid.

“It’s been a while and it is time to bring it back,” David McLeod, manager of Manitoba’s Native Communications Inc., said at Thursday’s announcement event.

“Music is so important in this city.”

Premier Wab Kinew said the province is spending $1.5 million on the awards show.

While Kinew said the awards show is going to be “so hype,” he also acknowledged that the announcement comes at a difficult time in the world, as the U.S.-Israel war with Iran continues and U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats to annex Canada linger in the background.

“Who is going to stand up and turn things around and mess things up for the better? I firmly believe that it’ll be the artists.”

A host for the 2027 awards has not yet been named.

The Junos typically generate an economic impact of up to $17 million for the host city, according to a news release from the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS), which is in charge of the event.

Allan Reid, president and CEO of the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, said Winnipeg has always carried more than its weight in musical talent.

“This city has shaped Canadian music,” he said at the event, naming artists such as The Guess Who, Neil Young, Begonia and William Prince.

The awards debuted under the Junos name in 1971 but go back to 1964, when they were known as the RPM Gold Leaf Awards. At that time they were named after RPM Magazine where the winners — determined by a reader poll — were revealed.

There were no formal award ceremonies until the first one on Feb. 23, 1970, in Toronto.

They were renamed the Junos the following year in tribute to Pierre Juneau, head of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, who was instrumental in establishing content regulations for broadcasters to promote Canadian musicians.

Big changes came in 1975 when CARAS was formed to manage the awards and introduce industry-based voting for the winners.

It also marked the first time the event was televised, on CBC, with host Paul Anka serenading the audience between awards presentations.

But it was still a private industry function until 1995, when the awards transformed into a large public event.

Held at the Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, the landmark 1995 event sold 7,000 tickets and was hosted by the cast of This Hour Has 22 Minutes. In total, with performers and industry people, total attendance was nearly 10,000.

The record attendance for a Juno Awards ceremony is 21,000, set in Edmonton in 2023.

1st trophies made of wood

The first trophies in 1970 were made from walnut wood and resembled a metronome. The material shifted to acrylic in 1975 but retained the metronome shape.

In 2000, a new trophy design became a statuette featuring a glass human figure surrounded by a spiralling musical staff.

From 2011 until 2020, the award was a solid crystal tower featuring a laser-engraved image of the spiral-wrapped figure inside. The statuette returned in 2021 and has been used since, but rather than glass it is now 24k gold-plated, hand-polished metal.

The awards were not conducted outside Toronto until 1991, when they were held in Vancouver.

Since then, they have been hosted in cities across Canada, except for in New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, Yukon, Nunavut, and the Northwest Territories.

Over the course of their 55 years, the Junos have evolved from a one-night industry awards ceremony to a week-long festival with programming that includes a songwriters’ circle and JunoFest — live performances from Canadian artists and Juno nominees across multiple venues. 

New members of the Canadian Music Hall of Fame are also inducted as part of the awards ceremonies. The Hall was established in 1978 with Jazz legend Oscar Peterson and bandleader Guy Lombardo (posthumously) being the first artists inducted at the Junos.

The first rap recording award was presented in 1991, and the first Indigenous music award in 1994. Anne Murray is the most decorated Juno artist with 25 wins. The Weeknd is next with 22.

This year’s awards show takes place March 29 in Hamilton with comedian, actor and singer Mae Martin as host.

The show will go live at 7 p.m. CT on CBC TV, CBC Gem, CBC Radio One, CBC Music, CBC Listen, and viewers can stream globally at CBCMusic.ca/junos and on CBC Music’s YouTube channel.

It will be presented with described video and closed captioning, and there will also be an American Sign Language (ASL) version.