In addition to the sonata and concerto, the violin repertory comprises four further principal areas: music for unaccompanied violin; variations; short genre pieces for violin with orchestra or keyboard; and transcriptions. The first examples of music for unaccompanied violin date from the late seventeenth century and the genre reached its first peak with the works of J. S. Bach. Interest in the medium then declined until it was revived in the current century by composers such as Reger, Hindemith, Bartók and Prokofiev. Among shorter genres, the variation form remained a favourite vehicle for performers from the early seventeenth century. It came to fuller flower towards the end of the eighteenth century with the popularity of the air varié, using a popular operatic aria or national folktune as its variation source, and became the favourite vehicle for bravura display exploited by virtuosi such as Paganini, de Bériot, Vieuxtemps, Ernst and others. The short genre piece, including romances, elegies, ballades and legends or national dances like polonaises, mazurkas or jotas, similarly found particular favour during the nineteenth century, and transcriptions of masterpieces of former times also became popular at about the same time.

Music for unaccompanied violin

Probably the earliest extended work for unaccompanied violin is Biber's Passacaglia (c.1675), comprising sixty-five variations on the descending tetrachord G–F–Eb–D, included as the last in the collection of sixteen ‘Rosary’ Sonatas. But there are also several shorter examples incorporated in John Playford's The Division Violin (1684) and Nicola Matteis's four books of Ayres of the Violin (Books 1 and 2, 1676; 3 and 4, 1685).