Melvin Benn, boss of Festival Republic – and festivals such as Leeds and Reading has informed Music Week that a new festival is on the horizon, and will be launching itself in to the festival spectrum summer 2013.

Melvin Benn, told the online magazine that it will not quite be on the scale of Reading and Leeds, but will instead be a small independent take on what he’s used to. Speaking about his new foray, he said:

‘It’s going to be a very small festival, very independent, very tiny. I am very positive about it. Festivals is a very busy, probably saturated market but there will be new additions next year and there will be people that stop doing it next year – that’s the nature of things. Overall, I feel very confident about it.’ 

I’m interested to see what this means for next summer, and what the movement towards smaller ’boutique’ festivals will mean for Festival Republic. Of course, Reading and Leeds have been enormous successes in their own right and are known for pulling huge crowds due to the names they manage to ascribe to their line ups. This year for example sees cult rockers The Cure take to the stage alongside band-of-the-moment Kasabian and Foo Fighters. This set of headliners will be joined by the likes of Metronomy, Justice, At the Drive in, Bullet for my Valentine, All Time Low, Florence and the Machine plus more – an incredible set of names for the Bank Holiday Weekend festivals. This new festival, being notably smaller will no doubt target smaller names, so I’m excited to see how they make the transmission, and who makes the cut.

With festivals such as 2000 Trees and Y Not in existence, there’s competition. Further information about the new festival will be announced later this year – in September or October. Keep an eye out on the Phestival news blog for more.

Find more about Reading and Leeds here.