As the website www.floraisonsmusicales.com puts it, the Floraisons Musicales, or “Musical Flowering”, “enables new talents, young musicians and renowned artists to come to the fore in a festival stretching from spring to autumn. Their music-making enlivens the prestigious historical sites of Provence”. The website, though still incomplete at the time of writing, gives an excellent idea of the many concerts to come.

It also touches upon pedagogical matters and the philosophy behind the eclectic offerings, while reiterating the festival’s conviction that it has a major role to play in establishing a strong musical culture in southern France. Efforts have been made to devise programmes that bring performers and audience members together. Examples include “walking concerts”, “lecture concerts” and “discovery concerts”, all of which bring the public into direct contact with the musicians.

Although the predictably eclectic programme favours Romantic music, early music concerts are also in evidence: Spanish flutist Claudi Arimany and the Italian Archimède Quartet play in the cellars of Chateauneuf-du-Pape on 24 June, while a “walking concert” on the same day will allow listeners to take in all four Mozart flute quartets. Austrian cellist Erich Oscar Huetter will perform three of Bach’s unaccompanied suites on 21 August on the island of Porquerolles and a concert dedicated to virtuosos of the Italian baroque will be held on 19 July in Rosans. On 15 August the Ensemble Vocal de Nice will give a programme entitled “French Sacred Music of the 18th and 19th Centuries”.