Balance in the Balance: Ensemble Diderot at Wigmore Hall

When

30 March, 2026

Where

Wigmore Hall, London

Who

Ensemble Diderot

What

Baroque trio sonata programme

Johann Sebastian Bach: Trio Sonata in C BWV529

Jean-Marie Leclair: Trio Sonata in D minor Op. 4 No. 3

Johann Gottlieb Goldberg: Trio Sonata in C BWV1037 (attributed to Johann Sebastian Bach)

François Couperin: Trio Sonata in D minor ‘La Convalescente’

Antonio Vivaldi: Trio Sonata in G RV820

George Frideric Handel: Trio Sonata in F HWV392

Antonio Vivaldi: Trio Sonata in D minor Op. 1 No. 12 RV63 ‘La Follia’

Ensemble Diderot © Julien Benhamou

Live Notes

The Wigmore Hall programme of Baroque trio sonatas on 30 March 2026 (part of the Hall’s spring chamber series), performed by Ensemble Diderot—led by violinist Johannes Pramsohler, with Roldán Bernabé (second violin), Gulrim Choï (cello), and Philippe Grisvard (harpsichord)—was, on paper, an intelligent and attractive survey: Bach’s exploratory rethinking of trio texture set alongside the Franco-Italian synthesis of Leclair and Couperin, and the more overtly theatrical impulses of Vivaldi and Handel. It promised contrast, lineage, and stylistic breadth. In execution, however, the evening settled into something more equivocal—consistently engaging, often thoughtful, but only intermittently compelling.

The central issue lay in the ensemble’s chosen scoring. Opting to realise the trio sonatas with two violins over a continuo line doubled by cello proved, in this acoustic, a misjudgment. Wigmore Hall’s famously warm yet intimate resonance—so often ideal for chamber clarity—here worked against the lower voice. Choï’s cello, rather than grounding the texture, was frequently subsumed into a generalized bass presence, its articulation blurred and its contrapuntal agency diminished. What should have been a dynamic three-part conversation became, too often, a top-heavy discourse between the bright, stylistically alert violins of Pramsohler and Bernabé, with the bass relegated to an indistinct harmonic underpinning. This imbalance was particularly evident in the Bach C major Sonata (BWV 529), where the composer’s intricate redistribution of material depends on clarity of line and a sense of equal partnership. The performers shaped phrases with care, and there was no shortage of stylistic awareness—Pramsohler’s direction was consistently poised, and Bernabé an attentive and responsive partner—yet the structural dialogue, so crucial to Bach’s reimagining of the trio principle, never fully registered. The fugally inclined passages in particular lacked tensile definition, the bass line failing to assert its thematic independence with sufficient presence.

By contrast, the evening’s most persuasive moment came in the opening Vivaldi work, performed without the second violin. The resulting texture was immediately more transparent and proportionate. Freed from the density of competing upper voices, the interplay between violin and continuo gained both rhythmic buoyancy and rhetorical clarity. Here, the cello emerged with far greater immediacy, and Grisvard’s continuo playing acquired a sharper, more characterful profile. The performance possessed a lightness of touch and a sense of forward motion that the fuller ensemble rarely matched. Elsewhere, the programme’s stylistic variety was acknowledged more than fully inhabited. The French inflections of Couperin—his characteristic blend of elegance and expressive ambiguity—were neatly articulated but somewhat under-characterised, the ornamental language executed cleanly yet without the subtle elasticity of timing that might have given it greater affective nuance. Similarly, in the Handel (or pseudo-Handel) sonata, the contrasts between movements were well observed, but the larger rhetorical arc felt episodic rather than cumulative.

That said, the playing was never less than competent, and often finely polished. Intonation was secure, ensemble tight, and there was a clear commitment to stylistic propriety. Grisvard’s harpsichord continuo, in particular, was consistently tasteful, lending harmonic clarity without undue prominence. Yet one sensed a certain caution throughout, a reluctance to push the expressive boundaries of the repertoire. The result was a performance that satisfied on an intellectual level—its programme intelligently constructed, its execution consistently reliable—but which rarely rose to the level of interpretative necessity.

In the end, this was a good concert rather than a memorable one: a reminder that, in Baroque chamber music, questions of scoring and balance are not merely technical but fundamentally expressive.