Robert Plant, Kronos Quartet, and Toumani & Sidiki Diabaté have been nominated for the Songlines Music Awards 2015. Now in its seventh year, the awards are voted by Songlines readers and the general public. All of these artists' 2014 releases were included among Songlines' Best Albums of the Year.

Robert Plant’s label debut, lullaby and… The Ceaseless Roar, is nominated for Cross-Cultural Collaboration of the Year. The album features 11 new recordings, nine of which are original songs he wrote with his band, The Sensational Space Shifters.

The album "represents another new adventure in his restlessly creative solo career," writes Nigel Williamson in his album review, "a masterful and in places daring blend of his ongoing musical obsessions: from gritty southern R&B and jangling West Coast psychedelia to sinuous African blues and Middle Eastern beats ... The production—by Plant himself—judiciously favours raw and earthy over gloss and artifice but still sparkles and perfectly suits the rootsy potency of the music."

Kronos Quartet's A Thousand Thoughts is also nominated for Cross-Cultural Collaboration of the Year. Released in Kronos Quartet's 40th anniversary year, A Thousand Thoughts is a look at the group's geographically wide-ranging sources, featuring music from 14 different countries, including China, India, Sweden, and Vietnam. The album includes the four cellists who have been in Kronos Quartet over the last 36 years.

"David Harrington and his colleagues have long been intrepid world music adventurers, expanding the string quartet repertoire with works from diverse sources and genres around the globe," wrote Songlines reviewer Nigel Williamson in his five-star review of the album. "What sets Kronos apart from most who have trained in the Western classical tradition is their invention, experimentation with microtonality and ability to re-think the capabilities of their instruments ... Happy birthday to Kronos Quartet, one of the musical marvels of our ages."

Kora master Toumani Diabaté and his eldest son Sidiki have been nominated for Best Group of the Year. The duo released the recording Toumani & Sidiki on World Circuit, distributed in North America by Nonesuch Records, in 2014. The album is a set of unaccompanied kora duets, featuring both obscure, almost forgotten kora pieces and a new look at some Mandé classics from Mali.

The album is "brimming with burnished melodies and virtuoso playing and the production is pristine," wrote Williamson in the Songlines review. "Yet perhaps the most impressive aspect is the sheer diversity of the sonic palette ... Every note in this rich tapestry of strings is exquisitely calibrated in the pursuit of perfection."

Tony Allen, who released his album Secret Agent, on World Circuit/Nonesuch Records in 2010, has been nominated for Best Artist of the Year for his album Film of Life, released on Jazz Village.

Songlines magazine will release a compilation album on March 23 featuring all 16 nominated artists, including Robert Plant's "Pocketful of Golden" and Kronos Quartet's performance of "Luu Thuy Truong." The nominees are the top four in each category from the public vote, profiles of which are in the April/May issue of Songlines, on sale starting this Friday. The winners will be announced in the June issue, on sale from May 1. For additional details, visit songlines.co.uk.