Kippers, koftas and Château de Belle-Coste rosé. Not bad. Then Camilla Wicks in Wieniawski, Ravel and Kreisler, plus Oistrakh and Haitink in the Prokofiev first violin concerto, a CD rescued from the anonymous morgue. Listened to the new off-air recording of Vadim Repin playing the Tchaikovsky violin concerto (yet again -- LSO, Rostropovich). A typical good recording. Listened to Albert Spalding in 1948 playing -- carefully -- Bach, Corelli, Chausson, etc. Neat, careful, immaculate. I can't help feeling that Spalding's main claim to fame was that he was the first American to be able to play the violin. Good fruit season -- rasberries, pineapple, apricots, peaches. My pile of "to be listened to" CDs is shaming me. Time for a little brutality.