Six exceptionally talented young musicians from Northern Ireland have been awarded the Young Musicians’ Platform Award, supported by National Lottery funding through the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and BBC Northern Ireland.

The six award recipients include classical awardees: opera singer Andrew Irwin, cellist Angus McCall and pianist Justine Gormley; traditional music awardees: Jack Warnock and Rose Connolly, and singer-songwriter awardee: ROE.

The biennial awards are run by the Arts Council in collaboration with BBC Northern Ireland, and aim to showcase and support the development of young musicians from the region, by providing individual funding awards of up to £5,000. This funding enables the recipients to spend a sizeable amount of time learning from a master musician, mentor, teacher or composer either in Northern Ireland or abroad. For the first time, the awards have been extended beyond the classical and folk music arenas to reach out to singer-songwriters in the region.

The awardees will also get two professional radio broadcast engagements, including one with the Ulster Orchestra in 2021.

Three presenters from BBC Radio Ulster will mentor the new awardees, helping them prepare for their upcoming performances with the Ulster Orchestra.

“The Arts Council is committed to providing valuable, meaningful opportunities for our artists to develop their professional careers and we are hugely proud to partner once again with BBC Northern Ireland to offer these awards to exceptional young musicians," said Ciaran Scullion, head of music on the Arts Council of Northern Ireland. "All of the previous recipients of this award have gone on to have incredibly successful careers in music and I’ve every confidence that the new recipients will benefit greatly from this experience.”

Previous recipients of the Young Musicians’ Platform Award include acclaimed classical pianist Michael McHale, soprano Laura Sheerin, harpist Richard Allen, violinist Michael Trainor, folk artists Conor Mallon and Niall Hanna and jazz drummer Ed Dunlop, among others.

ROE has been a Hot Press mainstay ever since her stunning debut EP Things We Don't Talk About, and Derry native Jack Warnock won the 2018 BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Music Award.