It may have taken eight months to make it across the country but John Adams’ new (ish) piano concerto Must the Devil Have All the Good Tunes? finally made it to New York last night as part of the Lincoln Center’s Great Performers series. With its original soloist – a magnetic and impressively funky Yuja Wang – plus the Los Angeles Philharmonic under music and artistic director Gustavo Dudamel, this was a chance for the East Coast to enjoy a slice of what the West Coast gets to hear on a weekly basis.

Yuja Wang and the LA Phil. Photo © Richard Termine

Devil is actually Adams’ third piano concerto, following on from the Takemitsu-inspired Eros Piano (1989) and then Century Rolls (1997), which takes its cue from Bill Evans. The work, says Adams, is a sort of barroom Totentanz written in a “funk-invested American style.” In fact, the title inspired the work rather than the other way around. “I thought to myself, ‘that’s a good title just waiting for a piece,’ he says.” In one continuous movement, it’s nevertheless broken up into a...