The soloist as a dynamic individual, the orchestra as a rigid community: no other genre traces the extremes of Baroque-era society better than the solo concerto. "Concertare": working together but also arguing - the virtuoso exhibitionist destabilises, he asks, he attacks and the crowd (the orchestra) responds, it resists and tries to regulate.

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Under the influence of the Italian masters, the form of the virtuoso solo concerto spread and was soon heard throughout Europe. Bach, Pisendel, Quantz, Hertel, Fasch or Durant, themselves acknowledged instrumentalists, excelled in this genre, liberating instruments from their roles as accompanists.

In this programme, the musicians of the Ensemble Diderot take turns in the limelight to play both the accompaniment and the brilliant solo parts, allowing subjective expressiveness and social harmony to form a unique symbiosis.