Well, I was wrong, yet again. Hilary Hahn playing the Elgar violin concerto (Bavarian Radio SO, Colin Davis) turned out to be extremely impressive. Of course, her accuracy was incredible and her sound always immaculately beautiful. But she was also on Elgar’s wavelength. A bit of tasteful wallowing in the first movement, but the slow movement kept a good forward momentum and the finale was taken fast. The Elgar concerto has been lucky with its recording (with only Igor Oistrakh and the second Zukerman recording really falling over). Hilary Hahn, however, was well up with the front leaders, at the age of 23. Not as mercurial as Albert Sammons; but rewarding in her own right. My pre-judgments were wrong. And the Elgar suited her much better than did the Shostakovich first concerto. Colin Davis was also a good partner in this concerto, experienced Elgarian as he is. A good addition to my list of favoured recordings of this work.