OXFORD — It’s no April Fools’ joke: The Nateva Festival has been canceled.

The second annual four-day festival, which was scheduled to take place Aug. 4-7 at the Oxford Fairgrounds, is off the books. Festival organizers announced Friday afternoon that slow ticket sales and the “very crowded summer festival schedule” contributed to their decision to cancel.

“It’s hugely unfortunate,” festival publicist Jim Britt said. “It’s really just dollars and cents, and time and place.”

Nateva Festival founder and promoter Frank Chandler “made a decision not to go down a path where bad decisions get made and people get hurt,” Britt said.

Phish had recently announced one of its largest concert festivals in years at Watkins Glen International, near Ithaca, N.Y., and Nateva Festival organizers feared  competition for attendees between the two festivals would be too much, Britt said.

“In the end, it’s all about being able to put forth a first-rate event that everyone can be proud of and that our customers can enjoy,” Chandler said in a prepared statement. “We just don’t have the confidence to go forward at this time.”

Britt would not rule out the possibility of the Nateva Festival coming back to Maine in 2012.

“That was my first question,” publicist Britt said. “Is this it?”

“It’s a never-say-never situation,” he said, adding, “Nateva is not going to happen this year.”

Concert-goers who had already purchased tickets through the event’s website, www.natevafestival.com, will receive refunds for tickets and per-ticket fees, organizers said.