16 February –
Belle & Sebastian win the British Breakthrough Award at the
Brit Awards, leading to allegations that voting was rigged in their favour and that
Steps would have won. Fans of Belle & Sebastian argued that the band have a large student following, and felt that the award should be given in recognition of artistic merit, rather than popularity or CD sales.
21 March – Irish girl group
B*Witched score a fourth consecutive number one in the UK singles chart with "
Blame It on the Weatherman", thus becoming the first band to have all their first four singles enter at the top and setting a new record that would be broken a year later by
Westlife.
27 June – The first performance of Tobias and the Angel, a one act church cantata by
Jonathan Dove, takes place at Christ Church,
Highbury as part of the Almeida Festival, directed by Kate Brown.
18 September – The first performance of
Cyril Rootham‘s The Lady of Shalott, a setting of
Tennyson’s poem for mezzo-soprano, chorus and orchestra, takes place in the School Hall,
Eton College, by the Broadheath Singers and the Windsor Sinfonia, conducted by Robert Tucker. Rootham wrote the piece circa 1909–1910, but it was not performed in his lifetime.
21 September –
David Bowie releases Hours, his twenty-first studio album and the first by a major artist to be made legally available as an electronic download.[7]
December –
Alan McGee announces the dissolution of
Creation Records after 16 years. The final release for the label would be
Primal Scream's album "
XTRMNTR", released in January 2000.
16 February –
Belle & Sebastian win the British Breakthrough Award at the
Brit Awards, leading to allegations that voting was rigged in their favour and that
Steps would have won. Fans of Belle & Sebastian argued that the band have a large student following, and felt that the award should be given in recognition of artistic merit, rather than popularity or CD sales.
21 March – Irish girl group
B*Witched score a fourth consecutive number one in the UK singles chart with "
Blame It on the Weatherman", thus becoming the first band to have all their first four singles enter at the top and setting a new record that would be broken a year later by
Westlife.
27 June – The first performance of Tobias and the Angel, a one act church cantata by
Jonathan Dove, takes place at Christ Church,
Highbury as part of the Almeida Festival, directed by Kate Brown.
18 September – The first performance of
Cyril Rootham‘s The Lady of Shalott, a setting of
Tennyson’s poem for mezzo-soprano, chorus and orchestra, takes place in the School Hall,
Eton College, by the Broadheath Singers and the Windsor Sinfonia, conducted by Robert Tucker. Rootham wrote the piece circa 1909–1910, but it was not performed in his lifetime.
21 September –
David Bowie releases Hours, his twenty-first studio album and the first by a major artist to be made legally available as an electronic download.[7]
December –
Alan McGee announces the dissolution of
Creation Records after 16 years. The final release for the label would be
Primal Scream's album "
XTRMNTR", released in January 2000.