Viola sonatas are three- or four-movement musical works written for the viola and an accompanying instrument. A viola sonata is usually written for a solo viola or a different accompanying instrument, but it can also be written for a solo viola or a different accompanying instrument. There were few works written in the form of a viola sonata before the twentieth century, though ancestors of the viola, such as the viola de gamba, were used in the Baroque era. Composers began to use the viola sonata more frequently in the first half of the twentieth century, though it remained a relatively uncommon form of musical work.
Although Johannes Brahms wrote two viola sonatas that were originally intended for the clarinet, and Felix Mendelssohn wrote a relatively unknown viola sonata when he was 15, there are very few examples of viola sonatas from the Classical and Romantic eras. In 1855, another Romantic composer, Anton Rubinstein, composed a viola sonata. Ludvig Norman and Mikhail Glinka, who left an unfinished viola sonata, are two other 19th-century composers who wrote viola sonatas.
The viola sonata was used by a number of composers in the twentieth century, including Paul Hindemith and Frederick Delius, to create a variety of moods and approaches. Dmitri Shostakovitch’s final work was a viola sonata. The notes were sparse, and the third movement included a reference to Ludwig van Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. York Bowen, an English composer, admired the viola’s tone and wrote several works for it, including two sonatas for viola and piano. A viola sonata written in the early 1920s is considered one of the greatest works of English composer Arnold Bax, and he went on to write other works for the viola. Bax composed a fantasy sonata for viola and harp, as well as a concert piece for viola and piano. He also composed a piece for viola and piano called Legend.
The viola is shaped similarly to the violin, though slightly larger, and sits in the middle of the violin family’s stringed instruments, between the violin and the cello. The tone of the instrument is thicker than the violin’s, and the mood can be darker, making it a good partner for the bassoon or clarinet. The four strings of the viola are tuned at perfect fifth intervals, and the range corresponds to the alto voice of the violin family.