After ending its subscription season on Saturday, the New York Philharmonic kicked off its hot-weather repertoire on Tuesday with a stirring concert on the Great Lawn of Central Park.

Dressed not in white jackets but rather open collars and shirtsleeves, the group projected more of a workaday look, as if this was an open rehearsal. The audience seemed to treat the performance as casual as well, remaining virtually silent as concertmaster Glenn Dicterow entered to tune the orchestra — although making up for this quietude between the movements of the Mendelssohn Symphony No. 4 to come. On the podium was Bramwell Tovey, who talks a bit too much but is a genuinely funny man.

The evening had all of the elements of an outdoor concert, including unpredictability. A sudden gust of wind wreaked havoc in the viola section near the conclusion of the “Festive Overture” of Dmitri Shostakovich. Afterward, Mr. Tovey said that the breeze had knocked all of the sudokus off of their music stands.

A critic doesn’t attend these affairs with high expectations, but I was pleasantly surprised by the intensity of play in the Mendelssohn. Where I was sitting, the orchestra sounded very good, aided by amplification but not of the obtrusive kind. The Andante con moto was actually quite beautiful, and the ending Saltarello was notable for judicial dynamic contrast and febrile bowing in the violin section.

Maestro Maazel was not there but, as Mr. Tovey launched into Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture,” it was fitting to think of the current music director’s commitment to the best-loved classics, those pieces of music that many current conductors, cowed by the press into performing user-unfriendly contemporary music with little or no substance, tend to avoid as déclassé. Mr. Tovey, whose sensibilities are those of a Brit who conducts the Philharmonic around the Fourth of July every year, described the piece, depicting a great victory over Napoleon, as “glorious if you are Russian,” but not so much if you are from the other side. The Phil dug into it wholeheartedly, the violas and cellos intoning a dignified chorale, the brass spouting the familiar heroic themes with gravitas, the cannon shots unabashedly loud. The crowd erupted in the one ovation of the night befitting its gargantuan size.

Concert marches written for band but played by orchestras can be a bit jarring and, as Vladimir Horowitz taught us all, are always offered too fast, but Mr. Tovey at least held steady in a trio of John Philip Sousa’s best. Monty Python fans take note: Sandwiched in between “Washington Post” and “Stars and Stripes Forever” was our beloved “Liberty Bell.” Toe-tapping music under the stars played cleanly and crisply; who could ask for anything more?

It’s rare for me to write the following sentence, so let’s enjoy it while we can. The New York Philharmonic sounded considerably more invested than the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, at least this week in the park.