Abbey Road Studios has named the winners of this year's Music Photography Awards 2026, with the public-voted prize going to a shot of an Oasis fan caught mid-air in a Buenos Aires crowd.
Joshua Halling won Music Moment of the Year - the only category decided by the public – for his image from Oasis's 2025 Buenos Aires show, a night Noel Gallagher named as "one of those gigs that none of us will ever forget." The award was presented by Jill Furmanovsky, who has photographed the band since 1994. Oasis also won Judges' Choice, with Angus Jenner's photograph from the opening night of the band's reunion tour taking that prize.
Elsewhere, Gabrielle Ravet won Behind the Scenes for a picture of My Chemical Romance fans in Seattle, and Frances Carter took Portrait for an image of Billie Marten on horseback in New Zealand. AF Cortés won Underground Scenes with a shot from a secret KARTEL show staged on disused train tracks in Brooklyn, while Dara Petrova was named Emerging Photographer of the Year for a photograph taken at the Laboratorium techno rave in Ukraine.
Tom Pallant, a two-time winner in the Live Music category, took the prize again this year for an image of Yungblud and bassist Silke Blansjaar performing in fog in Luxembourg. Yungblud, unable to attend, sent a video message calling Pallant "the best there is at the minute." Giulia Spadafora won the Festivals category for a photograph taken at Glastonbury's Stone Circle as the festival opened, a shot judge RAYE singled out, saying it "made me want to be the girl on the rock."
This year's ICON award went to Roberta Bayley, whose photographs of Blondie, the Ramones and Iggy Pop helped document the early New York punk scene. Bayley couldn't attend and sent a video message from New York, saying "I think of myself as just a lowly punk rock photographer, so to get an ICON Award is really special." The award was collected on her behalf by Platon.
Masayoshi Sukita received the Lifetime Achievement Award for his 44-year collaboration with David Bowie, including the cover shoot for Heroes, presented by Nile Rodgers. Sukita sent a message from Japan: "I will keep photographing as ever."
The guest 50 Years of Punk category went to Wayne Large, for a 1979 photograph of punk band members in Leicester's Castle Gardens Park.
Sally Davies, Abbey Road's managing director, said the greatest music photography "does so much more than document a moment, it captures something of the artist, the audience and the time we're living in."
This year's trophies, designed by longtime Cure collaborator Andy Vella, use a "daylighting" process built from extended exposures and time-lapse negatives. Abbey Road also confirmed Ethan Parker as its new Photographer in Residence, and named New York documentary photographer Destiny Mata as this year's recipient of the Tokyo Music Photography Residency, run with the Auckland Festival of Photography and T3 International Photo Festival.
The ceremony was held across Studios One and Two at the legendary studios last night and hosted by Lauren Laverne, with live sets from Kuleeangee and Tom A. Smith. Now in its fifth year, the MPAs drew more than 24,500 submissions from 42 countries across seven open categories, plus a guest category marking 50 Years of Punk.
The full list of category winners is available at abbeyroad.com
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