[2] Surviving rough drafts of the sonata's first movement, which use a bass clef instead of an alto, suggest that Shostakovich may have originally conceived the work for cello.
His Viola Sonata also marked a return to an idea that the composer had expressed in the mid-1930s of writing a cycle of works for instruments not usually considered ideal for solo roles.
In response to their proposal for a concert that would simultaneously open its 1975–76 season and commemorate his 69th birthday, he requested a program of his sonatas for cello, violin, and viola; the latter to be completed in the summer.
[6] In the final days before completing the sonata, Shostakovich complained about the inability of his right hand to remain still enough for writing[7] and had also telephoned Druzhinin on July 4 warning him that he was considering delaying further work as a result of his declining health.
"[7] It begins with an unaccompanied pizzicato figure in the viola which recalls the opening of Alban Berg's Violin Concerto,[11] followed by an austere piano line, which leads into a more animated middle section.
[7] After the successful revival in fall 1974 of his other opera based on Nikolai Gogol, The Nose, he requested the return of the manuscript for The Gamblers from his former pupil Galina Ustvolskaya, to whom he had given it.