Not content with being perhaps the world's greatest violinist at the age of 26, Maxim Vengerov is seeking new challenges. As well as the usual recital and concerto appearances, he's been performing in chamber groups, and has even swapped his Stradivarius for a baroque violin.

Now, with the assent of the English Chamber Orchestra, he's tried his hand at conducting. For the first half, he combined the roles of soloist and director in works by Bach and Schubert, and then a rarity - Mendelssohn's D minor Violin Concerto, an engaging work written when the composer was 13. Only in Mozart's Symphony No 29, the last item on an easy-listening programme, did he appear solely as conductor: a clean, poised performance, but lacking the electricity Vengerov generates with solo playing. He has an obvious rapport with his players and, conducting without a baton, shaped their playing nicely, but gave the impression that he was running with them rather than driving them on.

Then, alone on the platform after the interval, he held a packed Albert Hall spellbound: he's master of this trade. An arrangement of Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor, famous as an organ piece but possibly intended for solo violin, opened up an entirely new vista on the work. The thunder of the organ version was replaced by something more interesting, an intricate weave of melody and harmony. His encore was Paganini's Caprice No 24, his performance as dazzling as its composer, the original violinist-as-entertainer, could have wished. Vengerov's audience will be praying that he doesn't give up the day job - as a conductor, he's promising, but as a soloist he's a world-beater.