“Ohlsson brought out the intimate characteristics of the piano writing, playing the many runs with distinct clarity in his still-agile fingers. In the development, where the keyboard mostly accompanies important lines in the orchestra, Ohlsson tended to move ahead, rather than yielding to what was happening around him. For the cadenza near the end of the first movement, Ohlsson played the…

“After intermission, the acclaimed American pianist Garrick Ohlsson took the stage to perform Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2. Ohlsson is known for his fine technique and huge hands, which allow him to tackle passages that challenge other pianists. He could make the piano thunder in passages such as the grandiose openings of the first and third movements. He made it sparkle in…

“Ohlsson treated this early Beethoven work expressively, with sinuous rubato, keeping his rhythms precise, his touch light, and his rhetoric clear. Nothing, not even Beethoven’s many technical snares, seemed to faze him. And the pianist rarely pulled rank: every phrase seemed agreed upon rather than dictated to the Orchestra. Ohlsson’s many dialogues with individual players —…