It's that time of year when summer music festivals begin announcing their upcoming 2014 seasons. As winter settles in across the country, it's fun to look through these summer brochures and daydream about concerts under the stars.

Today, I received an announcement of a festival that sounds particularly appealing: the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence. This summer opera festival will unfold in extraordinary settings and historical venues, many of them open-air, in and around the picturesque ancient Provençal city of Aix.

Highlights of the 2014 season include two world premiere productions of historical operas, Handel's Ariodante and Rossini's Il Turco in Italia (The Turk in Italy). Ariodante is staged by London-born director Richard Jones, whose uncompromising--and sometimes controversial--productions of such operas as Anna Nicole and Queen of Spades have earned him an international reputation. Ariodante will have six performances at the emblematic Théâtre de l'Archevêché, with the Freiburger Barockorchester under the baton of Andrea Marcon.

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