Review: Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Santtu-Matias Rouvali conducting; Seong-JIn Cho, piano. March 2 at Orchestra Hall.

By Lawrence B. Johnson

On a weeks-long run of concerts memorable for the performances of conductors and soloists alike, to say nothing of the orchestra itself, the Chicago Symphony fashioned one of the most brilliant nights in recent memory. The concert March 2 was doubly highlighted by the Finnish maestro Santtu-Matias Rouvali’s account of Sibelius’ Fifth Symphony and Korean pianist Seong-Jin Cho’s dazzling turn through Prokofiev’s Second Piano Concerto.

But while those two works provided the main ingredients in this remarkable outing, they were prefaced by an exemplary display of the CSO’s collective virtuosity in Tchaikovsky’s “Capriccio Italien,” an evergreen showpiece at once infectious and deceptively exacting. The 37-year-old Rouvali, currently chief conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony in Sweden and principal conductor of the Philharmonia Orchestra in London, was making his CSO debut, and the instant rapport evident between band and baton utterly belied the newness of the relationship.

The “Capriccio Italien,” rhapsodic impressions of Italy as its title suggests, stands with the most imaginative and concisely written of Tchaikovsky’s orchestral works. Rouvali spun it out with a sure gauge of tempos, propulsive rhythms and a keen sensibility for the shading and combining of voices. The CSO responded with a performance as refined as it was rousing — grand fanfares from the brasses, exquisite playing across the woodwinds and a contribution from the strings that melded silken textures with driving rhythms.

Prokofiev was all of 21 years old and still a conservatory student when he began work on his Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor in 1912. The next year, he played the solo part for the world premiere of this fiercely virtuosic work. But the score was lost, and the version long known to the world is Prokofiev’s reconstruction from memory in 1923. Like the First Piano Concerto, the G minor bears witness to the composer’s formidable keyboard skills.

If the Second Piano Concerto has its moments of lyric repose, it is essentially flamboyant, electrifying, demonic. And Cho more than nailed it; he made it his own. The pianist’s bravura performance was the volcanic expression of something from within — not music mastered but generated. One could imagine Prokofiev on that bench, gleefully powering through episodes of staggering technical complexity. And where the writing turned reflective, perhaps summoning a folk tune, Cho revealed his poetic gifts and a readiness to let the line flow, the tension dissipate. Throughout a wild ride, Rouvali kept the CSO’s piquant support in precise alignment with Cho’s supercharged excursions.

Capping the night, in every sense, was Rouvali’s magisterial unfolding of Sibelius’ Symphony No. 5 in E-flat. And the story-telling of the Fifth Symphony is very much a musical unfolding, a grand exfoliation through rhythmic motifs to a dramatic consummation.

The rhythmic component is not the be all of the Fifth, or indeed of any of Sibelius’ seven symphonies, yet it is at least fundamental and distinctive. (Think also of the galloping figure that drives the finale of the Violin Concerto.) In the hands of Rouvali, who doubtless cut his teeth on Sibelius, the Fifth Symphony’s animating rhythms were not imposed: they were generative. They welled up from within, and the effect was exhilarating.

Not incidentally, the concept of rhythmic cells in Sibelius harkens back to Beethoven’s method of building out from cellular elements. Thus, formally, the two composers are not all that far removed, and Rouvali’s take of the Fifth Symphony underscored its classical roots. The gathering power that crowns the opening movement was a testament to both Rouvali’s command of the work and the Chicago Symphony’s melding of finesse and discipline.

That said, the ensuing variations of the three-movement symphony, an emergence from a soft rhythmic figure in the strings and winds through bracing orchestra-wide permutations, was perhaps the peak moment of the performance. Perhaps. Argument could be made for the home stretch of the finale and that great upward sweep to the concluding six chords, each ringing in its isolation until the last two, closely struck, end the work with a headsman’s finality.

The applause was instant and uproarious. The CSO had found itself yet another (Finnish!) conductor in his emergent prime. It was a great night at Orchestra Hall.

The latest in a string of them. And the pianist Cho followed solo appearances by two stellar violinists — one, Stella Chen, making her CSO subscription debut and the other, Christian Tetzlaff, an old friend. Chen, who played concerts Feb. 20-22 with conductor Jane Glover, was a late stand-in for CSO concertmaster Robert Chen (no relation), who has been limited for several weeks by an injury.

Stella Chen, 32, a California native, made a spectacular impression first with a poetic turn through Vaughan Williams’ fantasy for violin orchestra “The Lark Ascending,” and then in the virtuosic fireworks of Ravel’s rhapsodic “Tzigane” for violin and orchestra. Chen sprang into the international limelight when she won the 2019 Queen Elisabeth International Violin Competition; the next year she was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant. Why was she only now showing up at Orchestra Hall? Surely, we shall see her again soon.

Hard to say when we will see violinist Christian Tetzlaff again. After delivering a gritty, albeit eloquent, reading of the Sibelius concerto with the CSO and conductor David Afkham, Tetzlaff flew home to Germany and announced that he was done with the U.S. until the country changed its political course. He said he was canceling an eight-city U.S. tour with his string quartet.

“There seems to be a quietness or denial about what’s going on,” Tetzlaff told The New York Times. “I felt like a child watching a horror film. I feel utter anger. I cannot go on with this feeling inside. I cannot just go and play a tour of beautiful concerts.”