Richard Goode is an excellent programmer, and on Sunday night at Carnegie Hall he put on a typical show: a variety of music, most of it great. He was mostly great in it, too.

The pianist began with Bach’s Partita No. 6 in E Minor, which we heard superbly from Mikhail Pletnev last fall. Like Mr. Pletnev, Mr. Goode was liberal in this music, by which I mean that he played freely – ample pedal, considerable leeway, etc. He was fully pianistic, and if you’re playing the piano, that’s not a bad thing to be. Mr. Goode was fully Bachian as well. His playing would have been too plush for some, but it was never distasteful. The Sarabande was borderline Romantic – but, gosh, was it beautiful, and I think Bach would have enjoyed it.

In each of the partita’s pieces, Mr. Goode brought out all voices nicely. From beginning to end, he conveyed a sense of balance: a balance of mind, of hands, of everything.

Somewhat curiously, Mr. Goode used sheet music (and acted as his own page turner) – but this did not seem to hinder his concentration or expressiveness.

Following the Bach – and before we got to a late Beethoven sonata – we had the Six Little Piano Pieces of Schoenberg, composed in 1911. These pieces find Schoenberg in transition. The way Mr. Goode played them, we could practically see a new world opening up in Schoenberg’s mind. The pianist was understanding, sensitive – and very Impressionistic (on that subject, more later).

The late Beethoven sonata was the E major, Op. 109. In the first movement – right from the opening measures – Mr. Goode did some strange things with rhythm, which was unfortunate. I had the feeling that he was making a conscious effort to be different: and different isn’t always good (or Goode). The E-minor movement suffered from some slurring, and again Mr. Goode indulged in excessive and ineffective rubato. (This had not been the case in the Bach, I stress.)

But soundness was restored in the last movement, that sublime theme and variations. Mr. Goode’s judgment was excellent. We will not forget Myra Hess, but Mr. Goode touched the core of Beethoven’s music. Sadly, the last two notes were the least effective: Mr. Goode spaced them too far apart, making them unnatural, barely related.

The pianist played the first half of this recital very, very well: You can go many months without hearing Bach, Schoenberg, or Beethoven played this well on the piano. But even that did not prepare us for the second half of the recital, in which Mr. Goode was masterly – as masterly as I have ever heard him (and it’s been at least a couple of decades).

On the bill was Book I of Debussy’s Preludes – the book containing “The Girl with the Flaxen Hair,” “The Sunken Cathedral,” and “Minstrels,” to name three. Later this week in Carnegie Hall, we will hear one of the greatest Impressionists in memory, Jean-Yves Thibaudet: He plays Ravel’s G-major concerto with Kurt Masur and the Orchestre National de France. I dare say, however, that Mr. Goode need not bow to him.

This was Debussy of the highest order. Each prelude sounded like the “picture” itself – the picture it was meant to conjure up, musically. From Mr. Goode, there was just enough blur, and just enough clarity. Nothing was harsh, but nothing was too self-effacing, either. As in the Bach – and the last movement of the Beethoven – Mr. Goode conveyed a sense of balance, of soundness. He knew what he was doing, and what Debussy wanted (and they were the same).

“Les collines d’Anacapri” was intoxicating. And “Ce qu’a vu le vent de l’ouest” reminds me of something: Have I mentioned that Mr. Goode possesses not a little technique? The flaxen-haired girl was both matter-of-fact and exquisite. The sunken cathedral was unreal – and I mean that in the most complimentary sense. The minstrels were graceful and subtle, not hammy and clumsy, as they can sometimes be.

I wish to say, finally, about Mr. Goode that he held one’s attention all through – all through the two hours of this recital. That may seem like slight praise, especially considering the foregoing. But I assure you that – especially in music so familiar – it is not.

***

On Saturday night, another American pianist, Andre Watts, played to an overflow crowd at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. That is, the crowd spilled over onto the stage of the museum’s Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium. Like Richard Goode, Mr. Watts played a diverse, beautifully chosen recital, and a generous one, too (more than two hours). Unfortunately, Mr. Watts had a poor night.

He began with Haydn, one of his favorite composers (or at least one to whom he returns, over and over). This was the Sonata No. 58 in C Major, Hob. XVI/48. Mr. Watts started encouragingly, being lyrical, sensitive, and unmannered. He has a tendency to fuss over phrases; not here. In fact, he was jewel like. He used a shrewd amount of pedal, and he caught Haydn’s humor. As the first movement continued, however, he succumbed to bravura, and missed a bunch of notes. Jewel-likeness became over aggressiveness.

The closing movement was high-spirited, but it was also pounded, inelegant. And the pianist’s loud humming was more unattractive than he might know.

Next came two rondos of Mozart, that in D major, K. 485, and the strange, beguiling beauty in A minor, K. 511. In the first, Mr. Watts’s passagework was sloppy, his octaves were too big, and his detached notes were unnecessarily blocky. Moreover, his trills were effortful, which was odd, from this great virtuoso, in this itty-bitty piece.

He took the A minor at a very fast tempo, which was okay – if you can make it work – but this piece was spiritually untouched. There should have been more warmth in the F-major section, which some of us regard as virtually chorale-like. Later, Mr. Watts lost control of rhythm, and lost coordination between his hands. He used far too much rubato, and not even his loud singing could cover up the problems he was having on the keyboard. Better to have concentrated on a singing line.

The first half of the recital ended with Schubert’s Three Piano Pieces, D. 946. Initially, Mr. Watts was nicely rhapsodic, but soon he began playing like a vaudeville pianist: hammily and vulgarly. The second piece (Allegretto) ought to be a fairly simple song – and one longed for even one phrase to be played simply and evenly, without a wrong accent, without a distortion of the line. The third piece was pounded, and slopped over with pedal. Its compelling nobility was nowhere to be found. And missed notes – always part of the pudding (almost always) – were too numerous.

The second half opened with Debussy’s “Estampes,” three pieces that are monuments of Impressionism. Mr. Watts was sometimes racing fast – why? – but he deployed some pleasing colors. When he puts his mind to it, Mr. Watts is a colorist of distinction.

Then came five pieces from Gyorgy Ligeti’s “Musica ricercata.” Mr. Watts played this music with commitment and expertise. Unlike before, his percussiveness – stiffness and pounding, if you will – was not inappropriate. One of these pieces, for example, contains the marking “rigido.” I note, too, that Mr. Watts used sheet music in the Ligeti (turning his own pages, like Mr. Goode, and without incident).

He concluded the printed program with a slew of Liszt pieces, most of them late. Mr. Watts was often ruminative, musical, and persuasive. Probably his best playing of the evening came in the last piece, the Hungarian Rhapsody No. 13 in A Minor. He played with real gypsy flavor, and he ate up the keyboard (as of old). I dare say his Hungarian forebears would have been proud.

Would that he had stopped there – he offered one encore, Chopin’s C-sharp-minor nocturne, which brought some of his poorest playing of the night. Notes in the left hand refused to sound, frustratingly. And in the middle section, notes sounded all too much: This portion was so loud, so banged, so thoughtless, it couldn’t build, had no shape, had no effect. Finally, the C-sharp-minor nocturne happens to have one of the noblest endings in Chopin: Mr. Watts handled it passably.

He has played better in the past, and he will play better in the future. Even a big talent like Mr. Watts can have a tough night. That’s showbiz.