Most composers, when they write a Violin Concerto, usually consult with a good violinist during the process—unless, that is, they play violin themselves. That was the case with the Swiss-born American composer and violinist Ernest Bloch, who completed his big violin concerto in 1938.

Bloch was born in 1880, and was in his 30s when he came to America, where he achieved remarkable success with both critics and audiences. His most famous work, “Schelomo,” subtitled a “Hebraic Rhapsody” for cello and orchestra, premiered in New York in 1917, when Bloch was 36 years old. Despite his popularity in America, Bloch returned to Europe for most of the 1930s. By the end of that decade, the rising tide of anti-Semitism in Germany and Italy led the composer, then approaching 60, to reconsider making America his permanent home.

Bloch’s Violin Concerto was premiered in America on today’s date in 1938, a month after he arrived, with violinist Joseph Szigeti and the Cleveland Orchestra conducted by Dimitri Mitropoulos. The main theme of Bloch’s Concerto was supposedly based on a Native American theme, but the tone of the whole work echoes the Hebrew themes in his other music.

Bloch wrote: “Art for me is an expression, an experience of life, not a game or an icy demonstration of mathematical principles. In not one of my works have I tried to be "original" or "modern." My sole desire and single effort has been to remain faithful to my vision.”