Best of the musical best

Thirty-five local bands have spent the past several weeks vying for top honors at this year’s OC Music Awards.

This year’s event season started off Jan. 5 at the Detroit Bar, in Costa Mesa, with the kickoff of the OC Music Awards Showcase Series, featuring the first round of a playoff to win two of the award ceremony’s 23 categories: Best Live Band and Best Live Acoustic.

The series included seven free, weekly showcases throughout Orange County, featuring local acts like Make Moon of Newport Beach and Billy Kernkamp, Stacy Clark, Handsome G, I Hate You Just Kidding, the Colourist, the New Limb and Stereofix of Costa Mesa.

The sessions culminate in the Best Live Acoustic finals at the historical Yost Theater of the Santa Ana on Feb. 26, and the Best Live Band finals at the Orange County Performing Arts Center’s Samueli Theater in Costa Mesa the next day.

When the winners in each category are named, they go on to perform live at the main awards ceremony.

In addition, Fender will award the winners of each category with a $2,500 voucher for Fender products; this is the first such reward in the history of the Showcase Series.

Awards show organizers received hundreds of free submissions from artists throughout Orange County who vied for a spot in the showcases.

The OC Music Awards is now celebrating its ninth year of honoring top local talent.

This year’s all-ages award ceremony is slated for March 6 at the Grove of Anaheim.

Nominees in 2010 include new breakout acts and some familiar names who have either won or been nominated at past OC Music Awards events. The event also brings a new award category into the mix, with Best Folk.

Along with categories like Best Album, event organizers will bestow the Orange County Impact and Lifetime Achievement Awards on March 6, the winners of which have already been named.

The 2010 Orange County Impact Award will go to triple-platinum stars Sugar Ray, who have rocked Orange County and the world for 21 years.

Formed by five Corona del Mar High School students in the late 1980s as the Shrinky Dinx, the band saw its first major hit about 10 years later with the release of “Fly,” co-written and produced by McG, a longtime friend of the band who has since gone on to direct films like “Terminator: Salvation” and hits from the “Charlie’s Angels” franchise.

This year’s Lifetime Achievement Award will be bestowed on Jim Washburn, a longtime Orange County music critic and historian.

The majority of the award categories are voted on by members of the Awards Academy.

Duking it out for Best Album glory this year are Melanoid, Thrice, Saosin, Dusty Rhodes and the River Band, and Michael Ubaldini.

Best Song nominees include the Steelwells, Aushua, the Colourist, Atreyu and Eye Alaska.

Vying for Best New Artist are Blok, the Colourist, I Hate You Just Kidding, She Screams Remedy and the Steelwells.

The awards event’s official charity organization this year is Music for a Cure, formed in 2002 by members of Sugar Ray.

The nonprofit’s mission is to bring music and its healing effects to critically ill children through musical instruments, as well as support for music therapists and music therapy programs at local children’s hospitals.

A portion of the value of each ticket bought for the awards ceremony benefits the organization.

If You Go

What: OC Music Awards Best Live Band finals

When: 8 p.m. Feb. 27

Where: Orange County Performing Arts Center, Samueli Theater, Costa Mesa

Cost: Free; all-ages

Information: ocmusicawards.com