William Bolcom’s compositions, widely performed and recorded, include seven symphonies, various concertos, six operas and an extensive catalogue of chamber music. Reflecting the composer’s self-confessed fascination with the instrument since an early age, the four violin sonatas were composed over a period of 40 years. The 1978 Second Sonata was inspired partly by the great jazz fiddler Joe Venuti, many of whose stylistic tricks, including alternate left- and right-hand pizzicato, and double-stop slides, are incorporated into the work. Bolcom has described his highly dramatic Third Sonata as “stramba (weird)… Its last movement shares a mood somewhere between the darker tangos of Astor Piazzolla and Arabic music.”