Sziget Plans New Lake Balaton Outdoor

The team behind Budapest’s Sziget Festival is starting a new outdoor on the shores of Lake Balaton, which is the largest inland waterway in central Europe and attracts close to 1 million tourists a year.

The site is at Zamárdi-Siófok, which is on the shores of the 46-mile wide lake that – as it’s a landlocked country – is often referred to as the "Hungarian Sea."

Forty-five miles west of Budapest on highway M7, it’s the country’s most popular holiday resort and also attracts tens of thousands of Austrians and Germans throughout the summer.

Sziget organizers also put on the 15-year-old Volt Festival, which is close to the Austrian border at Sopron and within easy reach of Vienna and Bratislavia.

Sziget booker Dan Panaitescu, who’s also working on a bill for a new Polish festival, will be getting confirmations for acts to play Balaton Groove over the next couple of days, although the July 12-14 event looks to be similar in style to its Budapest relative.

Acts on this year’s Sziget (August 8-15) include Faithless, Chemical Brothers, Pink, The Good, The Bad & The Queen, Gogol Bordello, Gentleman, The Hives, and Sportfreunde Stiller.

Among those confirmed for Volt (July 5-7) are Korn, The Prodigy, Laibach, and Fort Knox Five.