The awards, held by music charity Nordoff Robbins, will take place on Fridat 28th June at the Hilton hotel on Park Lane in London. Previous winners of the award, which originated in 1976, include The Who, Paul McCartney, Sting, Take That, Muse and Elton John.  David Munns, Nordoff Robbins Chairman, said: “Alison is an incredible talent and is the perfect choice for our PPL Classical Award at the O2 Silver Clef Awards this year. She represents everything that is good and innovative about classical music today…Since the Silver Clef Awards began 38 years ago, they have raised over £8 million for Nordoff Robbins, allowing us to transform the lives of many thousands of disadvantaged and vulnerable people with music therapy. But we still have a long way to go to ensure we can deliver our music services to all those who need them..This year, we hope to raise £500,000 from the Awards to fund 20,000 life-transforming music therapy sessions for children and adults across the UK.”

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Balsom said of the accolade: “I am truly honoured to be receiving the PPL Classical Award at the 2013 O2 Silver Clef Awards. I am so proud to be involved with something so vital and life-changing for so many people…As a musician, I can’t think of a more valuable thing for me to do than to help highlight the constant need for a charity such as Nordoff Robbins. The value of something which is abstract and yet healing, unquantifiable, and yet so obviously transforming, is something that we as musicians live and breathe every day. I am so moved to see it being shared so skilfully in music therapy, helping so many children and adults in so many profound ways.” 

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