Nikolai Lugansky, Wigmore Hall, London ****<br></br>Wu Qian, Wigmore Hall, London, **

Nikolai Lugansky is one cool customer. He ambles on to the platform as if he needn't prove a thing, and his playing has a detached, easy quality. On the evidence of Saturday's recital (and his latest CD), this makes him an ideal pianist in Rachmaninov, because he doesn't overload heavy passages nor labour sentiment. He's stylish, too, knowing just when and how to bend rhythms and gauging his touch for maximum impact and clarity.

The Op 3, Morceaux de Fantaisie, including the hackneyed C sharp minor Prelude, came up like new, freshly chiselled. In the Op 33, Etudes tableaux, he showed not the least sign of strain, so that even the gloom and doom of the last piece occurred like a force of nature, not wilfully imposed.

But Lugansky's aloof and measured approach did less for Mozart and Beethoven. In the first movement of Mozart's F major Sonata, K533/494, his division of structure and the less essential notes seemed coldly calculated, his lazy tempo in the middle movement only bearable because he omitted repeats. The opening movement of Beethoven's Appassionata Sonata lacked intensity, while the variations of the second were dry and plain. The finale was more satisfying – immaculately played, though still cool.

The encores were splendid: the drama of Chopin's C minor Nocturne built up tellingly from austere beginnings; Rachmaninov's G minor Prelude was powerful without pomp; and finally, a delightful surprise – Debussy's first Arabesque, transparent as water.

Nineteen-year-old Wu Qian (pronounced Chen) gave her first full recital at the Wigmore Hall the following night. She tried a bit too hard to prove her stamina in a programme of hefty warhorses. She played the Bach-Busoni Chaconne beautifully, following it with Alfred Schnittke's Improvisation and Fugue, relentlessly punishing on the fingers, and then tried to lift our spirits in Scriabin's Fourth Sonata. Or was she really trying? The short first movement seemed glacial, and the longer second failed to catch fire.

The suspicion that Qian is, at present, no more than a very talented student was confirmed after the interval, when she played Liszt's Second Ballade without exerting herself emotionally at all; nor did she bring much imagination to bear on Schumann's Symphonic Studies. People often complain – unjustifiably, in many cases – that today's young pianists are technically accomplished but lack individual character. Here was an example.