The Violin Concerto Op. 36 is the first large composition that Arnold Schönberg completed in exile in the USA. The desire to write a violin concerto had already been on his mind since 1922 and he created the first drafts in February of that year. Questions still remain concerning the dating of the individual work phases and it is a matter dealt with by Schönberg researchers. One thing that is certain is that the diazo copy arrived with Schönberg on 5 June 1937. His son Georg had completed it between February and May 1937 and his son-in-law Felix Greissle was responsible for the parts for the individual instruments; both of them still lived at that time in Vienna.

The original print of the violin concerto was done by the publishers G. Schirmer in New York, but they allowed themselves a great deal of time before publishing it, something Schönberg complained about in a letter to Anton von Webern: “Neither the violin concerto nor the 4^th string quartet have appeared to date. It is unbelievable how long everything takes here.” Similarly complicated was also the search for a suitable soloist for the premiere. Schönberg’s favoured candidate was initially Jascha Heifetz who he had originally contacted in October 1935. Heifetz turned down the offer of performing at the premiere after a great deal of hesitation. It was then Schönberg’s brother-in-law, the violinist Rudolf Kolisch, who recommended Louis Krasner as a soloist. He performed the violin concerto for the first time on 6 December 1940, accompanied by the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Leopold Stokowski.