Kaz Hawkins

Hawkins was born and grew up in Belfast. She enjoyed singing at church, and was influenced by her grandmother singing at home.[1] In her youth, she auditioned for the television show Opportunity Knocks where the musical director told her grandmother to let her listen to Etta James.[2] She suffered abuse by a relative as a child which she kept a secret from the rest of her family until she revealed the extent of it following an attempted suicide decades later.[1] To cope with the distress, she self-harmed. After her recovery she covered the cuts with tattoos.

Kaz became addicted to cocaine and suffered domestic violence from an abusive relationship, which ended after the police were called when she returned home. Kaz's song "Lipstick & Cocaine" is a thank you to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) officer and doctor who saved her life after a brutal attack from her ex partner.

After a two years clean from cocaine she began to form songs from the poems she had been writing in her journals. She began learning acoustic guitar and now uses in her music to aid mental health awareness.[2]

Hawkins sang in cover bands for 20 years before she began creating original material.[3]

She has released four studio albums, two EPs (no longer available), one live album (digital only) and a compilation album exclusively on vinyl.

In 2017, she began presenting a blues show on BBC Radio Ulster, "Kaz Hawkins Got The Blues".[4] produced by Ralph McLean. She is also Ambassador and honorary member of The UK Blues Federation. She is also an avid supporter of mental health awareness[2] and was an ambassador from 2017-2019 for Aware NI,[5] where she wrote and donated a song called "Don't Slip Away" to help with Youth Suicide in Northern Ireland.[6] She has been called the "one-woman mental health musician" [7] and given talks at Boston University,.

Kaz was invited to Florence Academy of Art in Alabama where she told her life story using words and song to show how music can be used as a mental health tool, she was asked to join in a various artists album "Something In The Water" to help highlight children not having access to arts in Alabama. The album included one of the original Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section, David Hood and respected musicians Clayton Ivey & Will McFarlane supporting a line up of international artists covering songs recorded in Alabama.

Kaz visited prisons and schools in Beauvais, France at the invite of Le Blues Autour Du Zinc Festival where she highlighted the need for music as a tool for recovery. After that successful visit, she was invited to meet with and perform for patients at a mental institute and women's refuge near Limoges at the invitation of Le Buis Blues Festival, France..

Hawkins won the 2018 for Northern Ireland Blues Act of the Year at the UK Blues Awards and she was a Nominee in 4 Categories – Female Vocalist/Songwriter/Personality and Northern Ireland Blues Act of the Year. She was the most played artist of 2017 IBBA and was the first UK act to win at the EBU - European Blues Challenge in Denmark in 2017.[8][9] She was a Semi-Finalist in The Blues Foundation's International Blues Challenge, Memphis, 2017[10][11]

Hawkins won the Album Of The Year award in the 2016 IBBA CHARTS (International Blues Broadcasters Association)[12]

Winner – 3rd UK Blues Challenge 2016 (representing UK in Memphis & Denmark)[13]

She was Runner Up in the British Blues Awards for Female Vocalist 2016,[14] winner at the Pure M Awards for Best Video 2016 for "This Is Me".[15] In 2015, she received the Barry Middleton Memorial Award for Emerging Artist at the British Blues Awards.[16] The same year, she won all Ireland "Best Female at the Pure M Awards in a triple win of awards [17] She has also been a nominee in the NI Music Prize in 2014, 2015 and 2016.

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