Walton composed his Viola Concerto at the suggestion of conductor Sir Thomas Beecham for violist Lionel Tertis. Tertis had served as principal violist in Beecham's orchestra. Beecham, however, had not heard any of Walton's music.[5] Walton wrote in December 1928 that he was "working hard" on the piece and in February 1929 that he had finished the second movement. He wrote that he considered the concerto potentially his finest work to date; whether this assessment would hold true, he added, depended on how the third movement turned out. He completed the work by the middle of 1929.[6]