Sam Fender has donated the complete sum of his £25,000 award prize money to the trust for venues, which operates to save the Britain's grassroots live music spots.
He was awarded the prize on October 16 as his latest record People Watching was declared the top album of the previous year.
The musician has chosen to give the cash to the trust, in acknowledgment of the essential function local spots had in his initial steps.
"I personally would not have achieved my current career if it weren't for all the shows I played around the region, and elsewhere, when I was just getting going," said Sam Fender. "These spaces are legendary, but they are facing challenges."
Since the start of 2023, at least 150 of these spaces have ceased operations – approximately 16% of the entire UK sector.
In the last year, top acts such as Pulp, the group Coldplay, Katy Perry and Sheeran have all backed the Music Venues Trust in its initiatives to help venues survive, by including a modest fee to their admission fees, which goes to help independent venues.
He also participated, generating more than £100,000 on his live tour to assist numerous grassroots venues across England, Scotland, and Wales.
These funds helped venues that were facing imminent closure due to issues stemming from floods, fires and family tragedies, as well as permit problems, court cases and noise complaints.
Some locations received financial assistance in modernizing facilities and gear that helped artists and audiences.
"The concept that funds from shows in major spaces backs the smaller venues, where it all starts for musicians like me, is just sensible," Sam Fender has stated.
He is not the first artist to donate his Mercury Prize winnings to charitable organizations.
Back when they received the award in the mid-90s for their record their work, lead singer Jarvis Cocker declared that the act would contribute their cash to the charity War Child.
That year, musician she split her bounty between multiple charities, like the NSPCC and a Sickle Cell charity.
"I also donated a thousand pounds to my local community centre, to their gymnastics class, because I trained in gymnastics when I was younger and they needed better apparatus," Ms Dynamite told a publication.
In recent years, they contributed their prize money to the youth organization that nurtured their band, alongside other local music groups.
Additionally 1994 winners the group donated their winnings to a multiple sclerosis charity after a close contact was identified with the condition.
"The victory was sufficient," said singer Small. "The cash was the extra but we didn't require the bonus, because we had the honor. So our victory impacted somebody else's life."
Last week, the MVT revealed it had saved a couple of grassroots venues in that region, by bringing them into local control.
The Joiners in Southampton and the other in the city were acquired under the public acquisition initiative, which is funded by Arts Council England and supporters who purchase "ownership units" in the properties.
