Fodor's Expert Review Festival d'Aix

In late June and July, opera and music lovers descend on Aix for the internationally acclaimed Festival d'Aix to see world-class opera productions in the courtyard of the Palais de l'Archevêché and more of the city's most beautiful venues. The repertoire is varied and often offbeat, featuring works like Britten's Curlew River and Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle as well as the usual Mozart, Puccini, and Verdi. Most of the singers, however, are not celebrities, but rather an elite group of students who spend the summer with the Academie Européenne de Musique, training and performing under the tutelage of stars like Robert Tear and Yo-Yo Ma.