At the age of 18, the Chinese-born pianist Lang Lang already has a considerable reputation and an exclusive recording contract with Telarc, so it should be no surprise that his UK debut was a stunning success. But then teenage virtuosos who can whizz through Rachmaninov's 2nd Piano Concerto are almost too easy to find - there are plenty in Manchester alone. What really distinguished Lang Lang's playing was not so much his flawless technique and his ability to draw a massive range of dynamics and colours from the piano as the sheer joyfulness of his musicianship.

He is one of those rare musicians who can show a sense of absolute delight in every sound they produce. This never gets in the way of the seriousness or the passion of Rachmaninov's music; it is just an added factor that helps turn the performance of even so over-performed a work into a life-enhancing experience. In two encores he showed further dimensions of this sound-loving quality - a Chinese salon piece turned with miraculous charm and some glitteringly technical but still serious Rachmaninov.

But it was also the UK debut of Lu Jia, who has been conducting prominently in Europe for a decade. He opened with Messiaen's earliest surviving orchestral piece, Les Offrandes Oubliées, a work of cruelly exposed textures and exceptionally long drawn-out melodies. If it was a risky way to start with a strange orchestra, it nevertheless demonstrated his iron will in prolonging those sounds almost beyond endurance, which is the way it should be.

Just as risky was his decision to end the concert with Also Sprach Zarathustra, the massive tone poem by Richard Strauss. This is a work that bristles with problems of technique, rhythm and balance, giving some of its most prominent passages to unexpected corners of the orchestra, such as the back desks of the strings. To encompass all the details would take far more hours of rehearsal than can have been available, and even then it would need to be with an orchestra with which the conductor has already worked for years. But Lu sensibly put the focus on the grand shape of the work, building his climaxes with a flawless sense of design and articulating the sections with clarity and verve.

Details or not, it was an overwhelming experience. Lu Jia will be a most welcome return visitor to Manchester.