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Rutendo Kanogoiwa Showbiz Reporter
THE Zimbabwe Music Awards (Zima) is calling on experienced individuals in the music industry wishing to be part of the adjudicators at this year’s ceremony to submit their curriculum vitae before May 15.

The annual music awards, which resumed last year after a seven year-break, will be held in October at a date to be set.

Aspiring adjudicators can submit their CVs to Zima through an email address found on their website or Facebook page.

Zima marketing and public relations executive Farai Chapoterera said the call was open to anyone with experience in the music industry.

She said they were looking for eight to 10 judges to be the adjudicators and interviewers.

“Ideal candidates will have experience in music in one or more of the following areas: production, academia, journalism, promotion or management, and performance. We’re calling on arts journalists, music lecturers, musicians, promoters, managers and experts in music to submit applications. This will help the event to be a fair one and we know there are a lot of talented people around,” Chapoterera said.

She said as Zima they wanted to have a panel of judges that can competently adjudicate the various music genres that are found in the country’s regions. Adjudication has been an issue of great contention with most awards ceremonies, as there have been questions regarding the choice of adjudicators and the nomination processes.

“In 2014 we selected adjudicators based on our experience with various musical experts across the country. However, we believe that it wouldn’t be enough for us to assume that we’ve knowledge of all experts that could serve as adjudicators for Zima that’s why we’ve launched this exercise. Our aim is to come up with a panel that fully represents the numerous music genres as well as the country’s regions.

“Our selection process is very simple as we’re also looking for experience not forgetting the academic side as well and interviews will be held soon”, Chapoterera said.

She said they were still working on other things for the event but all was going well and the categories had not changed from last year.

Last year’s panel of adjudicators included Peter Mabhena, head of the Music Department at the United College of Education (UCE) , Matheus Bangure, the founding trustee of Music Crossroads Zimbabwe, Tendayi Shoko, a lecturer at the Midlands State University and Bothwell Nyamondera, a former engineer, producer and studio manager of Grammar records.