The three sonatas op.78, op.100 and op.108 for violin and piano, composed by Brahms between 1878 and 1886, constitute a marvelous evidence of the chamber music repertoire, responding to a formal and purely instrumental balance. They correspond to the ideal to which Brahms aspired. This Brahmsian ideal achieved with these three sonatas was, during Brahms's lifetime, the issue of debates and aesthetic conflicts linked to the end of German romanticism.

Let us quickly recall what is at stake in this debate. The followers of pure music, united in particular around the work of Brahms and represented by the critic and musicologist Eduard Hanslick, opposed the influences of Liszt and Wagner who reflected on new forms marked by the lyric drama, the cyclic form leitmotifs, as well as the symphonic poem, in other words, a music loaded with metaphorical expressions that want to be resolutely turned towards the future.

Music turned towards the future. This concept of modernity and avant-garde will be one of the foundations of creation throughout the twentieth century until today. In this context, the work of Brahms has long been difficult to situate in relation to the concepts of modernity, especially in France, because it seems that the foundations of Brahmsian writing cannot completely fall into this category. The issue is more complex and very fruitful for creation at the start of the 21st century.