Ricci's repertoire, which includes more than 60 concertos from the 17th to the 20th centuries, is the largest of any violinist's now before the public. This calls for a lot of practice. "When you're a kid," says Ricci, "you hate to practice. And when you're a grownup, practice is a pleasure. It lets you escape all the other junk. ... I don't have any trouble practicing in this building, because the old buildings have heavy walls. But if you want to practice in a hotel, that's hard. Sometimes you can use a mute. Or you turn on the television. Then they don't complain. If they hear a fiddle, they complain." Ricci has two major concerts in New York this year. The first will take place at Carnegie Hall on Saturday, March 3, when Ricci will join such celebrities as Andres Segovia, Yehudi Menuhin, Jose Ferrer, Jean-Pierre Rampal, and Peter Ustinov for a historic musical program to commemorate the 15th anniversary of Symphonicum Europae, a foundation whose aim is to promote international understanding and cooperation by sponsoring performances in every country. Ricci's other New York concert will mark another anniversary. It will be on October 20th -- 50 years to the day since he took the city by storm. "The early concerts I remember very well," says the maestro, who was born in San Francisco to a family of Italian immigrants. "For most prodigies, the problem is the parents. My father just wasn't every smart about how to handle me. Nowadays they don't have prodigies anymore because there isn't any profit in it. In the old days, a kid could get $2,500 to $3000 dollars a night. Everybody had their kid study." None of his five children has turned out to be a prodigy, but three of them are already professionals in the performing arts. Ricci's slender, attractive wife, Julia, is an active participant in his career. Westsiders for many years, the Riccis enjoy such local restaurants as La Tablita, Alfredo's and the Cafe des Artistes. Asked what he likes best about his career, Ricci says it is making recordings. "It's more leisurely. You don't have all the headaches. ... The newest development is direct-to-disc records. The music goes straight from the mike into the cutting head master, and there's no way to erase. If it's a 20-minute recording and you make a mistake on the 19th minute, you have to start over. I just finished recording the _Paganini Caprices_ on direct-to-disc. It's coming out this month. The caprices are very rarely performed in public, because they're so difficult." ******** WESTSIDER BUDDY RICH Monarch of the drums 1-5-80 "Mediocrity has no place in my life," says fast-talking, hard-driving Buddy Rich, wrapped in a bathrobe at his luxurious Westside apartment. "Anybody who is expert at what they do, I admire, whether it's drumming, tennis, or whatever. If they do it at the top of their form, constantly, I become a fan."