Musique Cordiale, an annual festival and academy in Provence, draws to the nine hilltop villages of the Pays de Fayence an orchestra of invited international professionals, a pan-European chorus, and musicians on the threshold of their careers. Symphonic and more intimate programs, in various genres, resound around the region from July 29 to August 9. This year’s tentpole finale is Haydn’s oratorio The Creation, which proceeds from the uncanny instrumental “Presentation of Chaos” to a first choral climax at “Let there be light!” (C major, all ablaze), and culminates with Adam and Eve singing God’s praises accompanied by the heavenly host. (The imminent fall is scarcely hinted at.) The quartet of soloists, in S.A.T.B. order, includes Rebecca Hardwick, Hannah Dienes-Williams, Aidan Coburn, and Malachy Frame. Graham Ross, who conducts, is the director of the Choir of Clare College, Cambridge. Also a composer, he’s recently back from a visit to Antarctica at the invitation of the Friends of Scott Polar Research Institute Musician. We await news of the promised “major new concert work” for the BBC Singers he worked on there as composer in residence. —Matthew Gurewitsch