Has play stopped using Ebean? It's my favorite Java ORM and I've never heard of Anorm.
SQL("select * from person where id = {id}").on("id" -> myAgeVariable).map(row => MyPersonObject(row[String]("name"), row[Int]("age"))).toList
...returns you a list of MyPersonObjects. No need for JPA bindings or any other annotations. Based on type safety, you must have the method MyPersonObject.apply(name: String, age: Int) or else the compiler will error. It's a great way of catching SQL funkiness inside your IDE.
When I use minimalist web frameworks, I get to use best-of-class libraries across the board, not make decisions based on damage control.
Examples of minimalist web frameworks: Sinatra, Flask, Scalatra, Ring/Compojure
I know many people don't like it , but I invested a fair amount of time into understanding hibernate and if I stick with the JVM I would want to be able to apply that.
For example: I remember in play 1.x various helper method were provided that were different from those in standard JPA including something that felt like properties in ruby. Not really a problem in practice, but required a litte trial and error when compared with the hibernate docs. However I imagine Play 2 makes use of various dynamic style programming techniques (via Scala) that might make hibernate behave in subtly different ways to what the hibernate literature might lead you to believe?
I appreciate that this is an extremely hand-wavey question.