At 80, Michael Tilson Thomas is showing resilience little short of miraculous. Sidelined in 2021 by the aggressive brain cancer known as glioblastoma multiforme, the music director laureate of the San Francisco Symphony makes a belated debut in San Diego. The program opens with Street Song for Symphonic Brass, a composition of his own that recalls his grandparents Boris and Bessie Tomashefsky, stars of the thriving Yiddish theater of yesteryear. Similarly nostalgic, the 20-something Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 1 in G minor, op. 13 (“Winter Dreams”) draws on folk melodies of the composer’s native Russia. As his centerpiece for the evening, the maestro has chosen Rachmaninoff’s razzle-dazzle Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, op. 43, launched from the springboard of the demon fiddler’s infectious 24th Caprice. A lifelong champion of emerging talent, MTT has turned over the tremendous piano part to Parker van Ostrand, identified last summer as a sophomore at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. His bio cites numerous competition wins, plus a school gala at which he played two-piano in tandem with the electric Yuja Wang. Talk about aplomb. —Matthew Gurewitsch