Adelaide singer-songwriter Aleksiah brought home four gongs at the SA Music Awards Thursday night, winning best new artist, best solo artist, most popular pop artist, and the Emily Burrows Award.

Alexia Damokas, 24, launched her solo career in 2022 with the single, Fern, which was also the opening track on her 2024 EP, Who Are You When You're Not Performing.

Her more recent single, Batsh**, has also been getting strong interest on streaming services, already garnering tens of thousands of listens since its release just two weeks ago.

Aleksiah will also benefit from the $5,000 APRA AMCOS Emily Burrows Award to further her career.

"Aleksiah is incredibly talented and is a really brilliant songwriter, has a sound that is melodic and accessible and quite dreamy to listen to, and she's done the hard yards over the past couple of years," SA Music chief executive Christine Schloithe said.

"She really is an artist who's starting to get some agency and build a national profile, so it's really not a surprise to have someone like Aleksiah walk away with the awards that she has tonight and it's really well deserved."

"I've got the feeling we'll start to see her on the bigger festival bills. We'll start to see her pick up some bigger support slots, and I wouldn't be surprised if she starts to get some international interest in the next year or so as well."

Also celebrated at the awards, which were held at the Dom Polski Centre, was Australian pop star Guy Sebastian, who grew up in Adelaide and was inducted into the SA Music Hall of Fame.

He told the audience about the first time he sang to an audience as a student, and how he looked at his shoes for the entire performance because he was so scared.

"I remember getting to the end of that performance and I looked up and I could see some people crying, including some of my mates," Sebastian said.

"Songs are incredible vehicles. They're like escape pods for people."

Winners show 'depth' and 'diversity'

Best group was awarded to female duo, Teenage Joans, which also won the people's choice award for most popular punk artist.

Best song was handed to Ceiling Fan by Swapmeet with the four-piece soft rock band also winning best release for their album, Oxalis.

Electric Fields won best Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander artist, while best regional artist was awarded to Indigenous hip hop group, Dem Mob, which cleaned up in 2023 with five awards.

"We've got a really great field of what I would call quite established and well-known artists that are balanced out by those artists that are emerging and starting to come through, and they're the names that we're just starting to discover now."

Crown & Anchor awarded

After a troubled year in which it was threatened with destruction to make way for student apartments — only to see a public outpouring of support result in government protections for live music venues across the city — the Crown & Anchor was awarded best live music venue.

Best large music festival was awarded to the Adelaide Beer & BBQ Festival, which was held at the Adelaide Showgrounds this year, while Space Jams, which took place at Alman's Hem in the Inman Valley, was again awarded best small music festival after winning the category in 2021 and 2022.

"And gender diversity is still not something that the music industry is particularly good at, so hats off to Lucinda Machin, who won the best studio engineer or producer award, and Rachel Whitford, who won the artists' manager award," Ms Schloithe said.

"It's really wonderful to see some women coming through the ranks there."

The Neville Clark Award for song production graduates went to Matt Stasinowsky and Joshua Rocca.