Nile Rodgers, award-winning songwriter, composer, producer and guitarist and co-founder of Chic, and Esa-Pekka Salonen, world-renowned composer and conductor and current music director for the San Francisco Symphony, received the 2024 Polar Music Awards from the hands of King Carl XVI Gustaf in a royal ceremony held at the Grand Hotel in Stockholm on Tuesday night (May 21).
The Polar Music Prize was first awarded to Paul McCartney and the Baltic States in 1992, having been founded and funded by Stig “Stikkan” Anderson, ABBA's manager and songwriter in his own right, as well as music publisher and record label owner.
Rogers spoke from the heart when he received his award from the king. “I know music changes lives,” Rodgers told the audience of more than 300 guests. “I've been told, 'Artists are the guardians of truth.' I am honored to be here tonight in such distinguished company. Congratulations to the excellent Esa-Pekka Salonen and all previous recipients of the Polar Music Award. To be recognized in the same way as Paul McCartney, Led Zeppelin, Chuck Berry, Joni Mitchell, Ennio Morricone and so many more of my heroes is a dream come true.
“I would like to especially thank the Polar Music Prize for recognizing so many artists of color and the people of Sweden who welcomed us with open arms, from Eric Dolphy and Miles Davis to Jimi Hendrix, long before most. He made. I say it from the bottom of my heart: We are family.”
In addition to the speeches, it was a full musical evening as Swedish artists performed the music of the two laureates. Among Rodgers' many hits heard during the ceremony and banquet were “We Are Family,” “Le Freak,” “Get Lucky,” “Good Times,” “I'm Coming Out,” “Material Girl “, “Let's Dance, “Spacer” and “Everybody Dance”. Salonen's music was represented by many classical pieces and a stunning cover of “Innan Kärleken Kom” (“Before Love Came”) sung by Eva Dahlgren, who wrote the lyrics for a 1995 album. Salonen was the conductor on the track . Dahlgren, a nine-time Swedish Grammy winner, received a standing ovation after her performance.
Near the end of the royal banquet, Polar Music Prize chief executive Marie Ledin, daughter of the late Stig Anderson, told the assembled guests of her personal relationships with the two laureates.
“When I was younger, I loved dancing,” she said. “Every weekend I would dress up and my friends and I would hit the dance floors and all the clubs, night after night, the DJs would play the irresistible music of Chic and Sister Sledge – songs that moved us and still do today. an unforgettable part of my younger days.”
Then Ledin rushed back for another memory. “In 1995 I had the privilege of sitting in the Berwaldhallen [a concert hall in Stockholm] to hear a young but brilliant conductor rehearse with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. I distinctly remember how he suddenly stopped the orchestra as he apparently noticed a wrong note in the score. I was surprised. How was this possible? Not only to hear that tiny mistake, but then to stop the entire 70-piece orchestra in an instant. I was impressed. Of course, that conductor was our laureate, Esa-Pekka Salonen.'
Rodgers and Salonen join a long list of honorees who have received the Award over the past 32 years, including Bruce Springsteen, Emmylou Harris, BB King, Burt Bacharach, Sting, Renée Fleming, Elton John, Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel, Paul Simon. , Quincy Jones, Yo-Yo Ma, Max Martin, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, Angélique Kidjo, Patti Smith, Wayne Shorter, Björk, Metallica, Diane Warren, Ray Charles, Ravi Shankar, Chris Blackwell, Dizzy Gillespie, Miriam Makeba, Iggy Pop, Grandmaster Flash, Yousou N'Dour, Gilberto Gil, Sonny Rollins and Isaac Stern.
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/music/awards/nile-rodgers-esa-pekka-salonen-2024-sweden-polar-music-prize-1235689478/