Victorious in The Community | Support for music acts from the Portsmouth area is key to what we do

One of our favourite things about Portsmouth is its wealth of home-grown talent and creativity. Being locals ourselves, Portsmouth is the very place we started out on our own music endeavours, and we feel it’s important to help try and nurture the future generations of music talent in the area.

Supporting local talent is something we are passionate about and are proud to have championed since the festival started. Victorious started because of our love for music both in our thriving local scene and in the charts. We wanted to create a space to bring both those worlds together on our doorstep.

Victorious provides us with a platform to showcase local music to a wider audience and as the festival has grown, so have the unsigned smaller stages, allowing us to bring in many more performers. Every year we receive and listen to thousands of applications to play and attend local gigs as well as engaging with key local promoters. We are thrilled to have over 11 stages on site, which is more than most major festivals, and these are filled with 175 talented, up-and-coming, unsigned, and new artists with a majority from the area each year. To date, we have provided more than 1,500 festival slots for local performers and counting.

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In addition to providing a platform for local and unsigned performers to showcase their music, the festival also offers a range of support, including links with local promoters and venues. Giving performers who are just starting out the opportunity to be on the same line-up as the artists they look up to and admire, or have grown up listening to in front of a huge crowd is an experience many will never forget.

We are thrilled to have recently announced Crystal Tides as the winner of our inaugural Road to Victorious competition. We created this exciting competition, exclusive to acts who reside in the PO postcode, to give up-and-coming local bands an even bigger boost. The prize is the ultimate band experience, with Crystal tides being put directly in touch with industry professionals and management as well as being given free recording time in a local studio. However, the biggest element of the competition is they will be going on tour with festival slots at Truck, Tramlines, Kendall Calling and Victorious. We are providing a tour bus and crew to give them the full experience.

This competition not only gives an act the chance to enjoy some amazing experiences but hopefully provides a fantastic platform to further homegrown success. If you are visiting Victorious this year catch Crystal Tides opening Castle Stage on Saturday at 11.20-11.50am and at Beats & Swing at 1.50-14.20pm. We’d love to see a huge home crowd for this incredible band.

As the festival continues to grow and evolve, we are hopeful that it will continue to play a key role in supporting local music talent for years to come and hope to grow the Road To Victorious.

If you’d like to find out more, please visit our website victoriousfestival.co.uk.