The Violin Concerto was commissioned by Samuel Fels, a businessman and member of the board of trustees of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, as a vehicle for Iso Briselli, a child prodigy and Fels’s adopted son.

Barber began composing the work in Switzerland during the summer of 1939, continued when he moved to Paris and finished in July, 1940 at Pocono Lake Preserve, Pennsylvania. The violinist at the premiere on February 7, 1941 was Albert Spalding, with Eugene Ormandy conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra.

In his notes for the premiere, Barber described the work as “lyric and rather intimate in character…. The first movement begins with a lyrical first subject announced at once by the solo violin, without any orchestral introduction. This movement as a whole has perhaps more the character of a sonata than concerto form. The second movement is introduced by an extended oboe solo. The violin enters with a contrasting and rhapsodic theme, after which it repeats the oboe melody of the beginning. The last movement, a perpetual motion, exploits the more brilliant and virtuoso characteristics of the violin.”