Ruggiero Ricci conducted a wonderful master class at Whittier College (near Los Angeles) on Sunday 24 November under the auspices of the Jascha Heifetz Society. Six students, I'd say ranging from 10 to 18 years old, playing Mozart, Kreisler, Wieniawski, Paganini, and Bach. He spent about 30-40 minutes with each pupil with only a ten minute break over the entire session. Ricci is in his early 80s and though he looks very frail, has not lost any of his technical faculties. He spoke relatively little but demonstrated and played along as appropriate to bring out the best in a wonderfully talented group of young people. He could still give a world-class recital if he had a mind to do so. While helping one student through the fiendish Wieniawski Scherzo-Tarantelle, he told a story about how he'd rigged up an induction motor to a phonograph so as to play Heifetz's recording of that piece backwards. He then proceeded to play it backwards, in tempo and without any apparent effort. Ricci focussed on bowing and essentially took for granted almost everything being done with the left hand. He encouraged one young woman to adopt an exaggerated semicircular bowing style to bring out features in a Wieniawski concerto that she could not otherwise obtain. With others he suggested very subtle shifts in emphasis and bow-direction changes that made noticeable improvements. The technical capabilities of these kids was so good that he helped them learn which rules to break in order to make music out of the notes. They also assimilated his suggestions within one or two passes. An impressive afternoon, to say the least. http://www.jaschaheifetzsociety.org/ Ravi Narasimhan Dept. of Physics and Astronomy, UCLA http://www.physics.ucla.edu/~oski