Standford says, "Writing a work for the first stage of an instrumental competition is difficult enough. When the competition is the International Carl Flesch, and the work has to be a concert piece (not just a 'test-piece') for solo violin capable of attracting contestants from all over the worked, and adding to a repertoire that already appears to include such formidable solo sonatas, the task is little short of impossible. 

The help I needed came from the great encouragement of the Director of the Competition, Yfrah Neaman, to whom the work is dedicated and with whom I worked closely in making the piece, and the kindness of Yehudi Menuhin, Jury Chairman, who studied the Sonata and approved.

And there can be no greater reward to the effort than when the competitors themselves wish to perform the work more times than the dutiful first.

The winner that year 1974 was Mincho Minchev.

The Sonata is in three movements, the first and last being cast as formal 'sonata' structures, and the central movement a rapid scherzo with two contrasting (and humorous) 'trios' and a slow introduction that serves as the scherzo, and the sonata as a whole."