Thursday night’s concert by the New York Philharmonic featured at least three elements: Riccardo Muti, guest-conducting; Lang Lang, serving as piano soloist; and an obscure one-act opera by Hindemith.

Mr. Muti is a man without a country now, which is to say he is without an orchestra or an opera house — but he is in constant demand as a guest. He started Thursday night’s program with a piece by his fellow Italian Cherubini (1760–1842). Cherubini was a big deal in his time, but he is known today chiefly for two things: Beethoven’s admiration of him; and his opera “Medea,” which Callas championed.

What Mr. Muti conducted was Cherubini’s Overture in G, which is not an overture to anything, just an orchestra piece — and a very fine one, too. From Mr. Muti and the Philharmonic, it was shapely beautiful, and (generally) precise. Early on, the music was delicate, but never feeble. Smooth strings contrasted with bubbling, almost puckish woodwinds. Later the music was ferocious and biting — but coolly Classical all the same. And the final section had a wonderful, tense excitement.

The Cherubini was a promising curtain-raiser — and a pleasure unto itself.

Then Lang Lang emerged to play Beethoven’s Concerto No. 5 in E flat, Op 73. This is the work known as “the Emperor.” And Lang Lang, as you know, is the young sensation from China. He turns 25 this week. And he gave an unusual, commendable account of Beethoven’s concerto.

He can be wild and woolly, but, in the first movement, he was sensible and measured. In addition, he played with considerable beauty. Seldom do you hear this music so beautiful (for it is mainly other things). Lang Lang applied a palette of colors to his Beethoven. He was lyrical and gentle where he should have been, and full and grand where those qualities were in order. He pounded his octaves somewhat — but not intolerably.

I should mention, too, that he listened keenly to the orchestra, meshing with them. This was more a collaborative than a soloistic effort.

At the end of the first movement, some patrons applauded, but they were quickly shushed, as always happens — and the applauders were right.

The orchestra began the middle movement exquisitely, and the pianist followed in the same vein. He played this movement exquisitely all through, and it sometimes sounded rather like Chopin, while remaining Beethoven. The transition to the last movement, the Rondo, is often misjudged — but Lang Lang judged it shrewdly.

And a funny thing happened in the Rondo. Lang Lang, famous for overexuberance, was restrained — and so restrained as to be almost too much so. This movement can be far more boisterous, and more fun.

The vagaries of musical performance are mysterious, and they are part of what makes concertgoing worthwhile. Also, where concertos are concerned, you never know what negotiations have taken place between conductor and soloist.

Encores after concertos are de rigueur for Lang Lang, and he pretended to ask the concertmistress for permission to play one. When he sat down, what he played was a piece of Chinese Impressionism, as I call it — or Chinese Debussy. Lang Lang likes to use these pieces as encores, and he made an album of them called “Dragon Songs.” In any case, the young man played the music beguilingly, enchantingly, applying those colors of his. Unfortunately, he had to compete with a whistling hearing aid — an instrument that had played during the “Emperor” Concerto, too.

That one-act opera of Hindemith? Written in 1921, when the composer was in his mid-20s, it is called “Sancta Susanna,” and its story is freaky-deaky: sex, madness, and violence at a nunnery. The score is of a piece with the story: It is spooky, dreadful, horrifying — very effective. I was probably not the only listener to think of the two Strauss shockers: “Salome” and “Elektra.”

Mr. Muti proved a master of that score, and the New York Philharmonic played extremely well for him. The flutes, in particular, were stylish and virtuosic. And the concertmistress, Sheryl Staples, played her solos with poise and smarts.

The two principal singers were Tatiana Serjan, a Russian soprano, and Brigitte Pinter, an Austrian mezzo. Their performances were similar: They were utterly aware of what they were singing, and they were dramatic without forgetting to be musical — this is an invaluable trait in an opera singer. Shunning undue histrionics, they chilled the audience to the bone, just as Hindemith requires.

All in all, Thursday was a most satisfying night of music-making — and, to a degree, of theater.