Despite Sommers' extravagant prose, few would dissent from his assessment of Beethoven's masterpiece, the only major violin concerto composed between Mozart's five concertos of 1775 and Mendelssohn's E minor Concerto Op. 64 (1844). As a model of melodic invention, spaciousness of design, sheer clarity and logic of organisation, Beethoven's Concerto has gained a place in the repertory of ‘every violinist, who aims at being more than the mere virtuoso’ and ‘has become the touchstone marking the maturity of the performing artist’. In terms of the audio industry and the concert world in the current century, it has long stood in splendid isolation, so rare have been the opportunities to witness performances of other late-eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century concertos, save perhaps Viotti's No. 22 in A minor or Spohr's No. 8 in A minor Op. 47 (‘in modo di scena cantante’).

Surprisingly, isolation of a less favourable kind coloured its early history. The present volume explores this concerto's background history, its genesis, its context in Beethoven's oeuvre, and the influences which combined in its conception.