“Smoky”, “vaporous”: the search for a sound for our bass quartet has been inspired by these words. How can we blend the violone (an imposing six-stringed bass viol, with a register close to that of the double bass), the viola da gamba and the cello into a common, homogeneous sound without losing the singularity of the grain of each string? How could we create a bond between each part, each instrument, to mgive the sonatas their fullest colours? This particular search for sonorities is a search for a means to blend the musical parts, thus creating a compact but intelligible texture. Could we create a deeper, more intense sound by playing on the ambiguity of the functions of each line of the score? By imagining zones of vagueness and uncertainty between the parts? In this idea is also the idea of breathing together, so that the sonorities of the instruments constantly influence each other. The viola da gamba and the cello seek to combine with each other; their sonorities, timbres, ornaments, phrasings and articulations respond to each other, to intermingle. The continuo creates several layers of sound. Between the bass line (shared by the harpsichord and the violone) and the chords, we offer a particular space for harmonic and melodic development to the viol or to the cello. A line whose undefined function joins the bass and the melody in support of the same quest: the search for a shared, concentrated and coherent sound.