GEOFF Ellis is in what may well be his natural habitat: a quiet stretch of parkland, where he is overseeing the preparations for yet another big outdoor festival.

Everything is in place: the stands, the ancillary equipment, the foodstalls, the many portable toilets. The cavernous main stage looms behind him, occupied for the moment by squads of riggers in hard-hats and hi-vis jackets.

Tonight, tomorrow and Sunday, that stage will resound to some of the biggest acts around: Radiohead, Kasabian, Biffy Clyro; Belle and Sebastian, Catfish and the Bottlemen, the 1975; London Grammar, George Ezra, Two Door Cinema Club. And the placid area we are currently standing on will be occupied by music fans of every age.

For this is the site of the first-ever TRNSMT festival, which takes place on Glasgow Green.

T in the Park is on hiatus this year as the organisers seek to get various issues sorted at its Strathallan home, though Geoff, CEO of DF Concerts, has stressed, however, that TRNSMT is not a mere replacement for T.

“Over to my left,” he said, “there’s the King Tut’s stage. It’s an outdoor stage, but a small one. That’s got all the breaking new bands on, like Lewis Capaldi, Declan McKenna, the Amazons, Sundara Karma, Tom Grennan, some great new artists.

“We’ve deliberately programmed that stage to not be like big acts at the top and smaller acts at the bottom. [The thinking was] let’s just get a good, diverse mixture of really good, new, breaking artists who hopefully, in a couple of years time, will be on the main stage.

“Then we’ve got the JD Tent with even more cutting-edge artists like Anteros. Then, there’s the Utilita Power Tree, though it actually doesn’t look much like a tree at the moment, where you can charge your phone and listen to DJs.”

He said they started working on the festival last August and “were booking artists before we had a name for it.”

“Then the name TRNSMT just came out. Transmission [by Joy Division, a band Ellis has always been a fan of] was the inspiration. It was taking the vowels out of it that spurred me. I thought, we can get all the different Twitter handles and domain names and everything else you need to do.

“It’s also just the idea of transmitting from the stage to the audience, and people transmitting good vibes to each other. And it feels like a festival name for the 21st century.”

There’s been a lot of talk recently about the economies of festivals. As recently as 2002, the Times said earlier this week, there were 400 festivals in the UK. This year, there are 1000 planned. Fiona Stewart, the owner of the Green Man festival in Wales, says the playing-field has changed dramatically due to the rising cost of artists.

Security costs this year have risen steeply, too, in the wake of the terrorist attacks. “There will be a significant security and police presence at TRNSMT,” the event’s website advises customers. “It’s possible that you will see some armed police, as in other locations around the city.”

“There’s a lot of festivals, which is great,” Ellis says. “There are lots of small camping festivals, which are geared around the vibe and the sharing of a common kind of ideal, or whatever. [You might get] kids doing face-painting and activities, and you might have gourmet food, and are probably less about the music. The music’s the backdrop.

“Whereas … at something like TRNSMT or any major festival, whether they’re camping festivals or metropolitan festivals, you can be within a big crowd, you could be watching Radiohead, or Eminem, Kasabian, Stone Roses, whoever – you’re there in a big audience, and suddenly, it’s like, yeah, that’s what it’s all about.

“That’s not to say small festivals don’t work. When you’re there with a thousand people or whatever, you’re still enjoying it, and it’s a different type of experience. But when you’re within that [big festival] crowd, you’re kind of bouncing, you’re going, ‘This is it …’ To quote the Stone Roses song, ‘This is the one.’ It’s a spiritual kind of thing. It’s what people will get with here with Radiohead, they’ll get it with Kasabian, they’ll get it with Biffy Clyro, and with everybody else.

“That for me is the real advantage of a major festival. Yes, there’s over a thousand festivals in the UK – fortunately, all of them different, because who wants a thousand festivals all the same? – but each one has its own identity. “

He said TRNSMT has the advantage of people being able to watch smaller acts then go and see big acts on the big stage and “that’s where you feel part of that unity.”

TRNSMT has been easier to organise than T in the Park – fewer stages, fewer artists, fewer complications, he says.

Furthermore, “you’re not dealing with all the rural issues – ospreys, pipelines, and all the different things that go with that. We don’t have to light up any car parks, and we’re not building a campsite. But you still have to get things right. You still have to do things on a first-class level. You’ve got to get all your medical facilities in.”

Geoff seems to be in his element on Glasgow Green, having put together another festival (from scratch, too), and knowing that another substantial crowd – he’s expecting around 120,000 over the three days – will be coming here this weekend and having a good time. Is the sight of so many people enjoying themselves its own reward?

Glasgow Times:

“Yeah, it is, definitely,” he says. “I love organising things. I formed a football team when I was at primary school, and I managed that, because there was no local football team for me and my mates to play for, so I formed one. You like to organise things and participate. This is good fun,” he says, indicating the activities around him. “I don’t go to work; I just do what I do every day, it doesn’t feel like a chore. I won’t say it’s not hard work, but it’s certainly not a chore. But seeing people enjoy themselves – you get a great buzz from that. Everybody here is working on site but nobody’s going [he puts on a moody voice]: ‘We gotta build a stage.’ They’re proud of it, and they want it to look great. If somebody says, ‘That looks really good,’ that gives them a buzz.”

Glasgow Times:

Ellis fully intends TRNSMT to become an annual event.” The city needs it, the city wants it. We’ve had great support from Glasgow City Council – they’ve been very responsive. As a city we’ve set high targets in terms of tourism and to reach them we need major events. The city needs an event like TRNSMT to bring in people, to get to where it needs to be to meet its economic ambitions. And it needs it culturally as well.”

Glasgow Times:

The site, then, is nearly ready but there’s still work to be done. As I leave the exit on to Greendyke Street, a BBC outside broadcast van noses its way in – a reminder that, if you’re not one of the 120,000 this weekend, you can still catch late-night highlights on the box.

TRNSMT, Glasgow Green, today until Sunday. Visit trnsmtfest.com