Ruggiero Ricci – The Glory of Cremona (LP, Analogphonic)

Nobody who attended the session at which Ricci made this unusual recording is likely to forget the sight which greeted one on entering the studio: the long table, flanked by two pistol-packing Pinkerton detectives, bearing no fewer than fifteen of the world’s highest pedigreed violins … Ricci took up the violins one by one, planted his feet firmly on the yellow chalk marks sketched at the prescribed distance from the microphones, and played on each instrument a selection chosen to show it to best advantage. It was a fascinating parade of pieces that are fiddle music par excellence, and Ricci’s masculine, unmincing approach suited most of them very well indeed. (High Fidelity)