Prior to his being announced as the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s music director designate in February 1989, Daniel Barenboim shared the podium with Sir Georg Solti on the Orchestra’s second trip to Asia in March and April 1986.

March 31, 1986 – Musashino Shimin Bunka Kaikan, Tokyo, Japan
April 2, 1986 – Bunka Kaikan, Tokyo, Japan
April 12, 1986 – City Hall Concert Hall, Hong Kong
TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No. 6 in B Minor, Op. 74 (Pathétique)
WAGNER Excerpts from Götterdämmerung
Daniel Barenboim, conductor

April 3, 1986 – Bunka Kaikan, Tokyo, Japan
April 5, 1986 – Toyota City Cultural Hall, Toyota, Japan
April 11, 1986 – City Hall Concert Hall, Hong Kong
SCHUBERT Symphony No. 8 in B Minor, D. 759 (Unfinished)
BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 3 in E-flat Major, Op. 55 (Eroica)
Daniel Barenboim, conductor

Following the final April 3 concert, John von Rhein in the Chicago Tribune wrote, “Before a raptly submissive crowd in the Tokyo Bunka Kaikan, [Barenboim] invested the Schubert Unfinished and Beethoven Eroica symphonies with extraordinary beauty and interpretive depth. Again, it is important to stress how greatly the audience’s involvement in the music-making, as shown by their intense silence and concentration, added to the effort that conductor and players were willing to put forth. Solti, who is rarely in the audience at a Chicago Symphony concert back home, attended Barenboim’s concert in Hong Kong Friday night and applauded as loudly as those seated around him. . . . His Unfinished, taken very deliberately, with a dynamic scale that often sank to a faint whisper, breathed an almost mystical resignation. Barenboim’s Eroica was tauter and faster in the outer movements than before—all the better to draw bolder expressive extremes, with a more consciously molded Funeral March whose grief was sublimated into stoic nobility.”

Barenboim again shared conducting duties with Solti on the Orchestra’s third trip to Japan in April 1990.

Poster advertising Solti’s April 18 and Barenboim’s April 21, 1990, concerts at Symphony Hall in Osaka

April 20, 1990 – Shimin Kaikan, Nagoya, Japan
BRAHMS Symphony No. 2 in D Major, Op. 73
BRAHMS Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 68
Daniel Barenboim, conductor

April 21, 1990 – Symphony Hall, Osaka, Japan
April 23, 1990 – Suntory Hall, Tokyo, Japan
BRAHMS Symphony No. 3 in F Major, Op. 90
BRAHMS Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 68
Daniel Barenboim, conductor

April 22, 1990 – Izumity Hall 21, Sendai, Japan
April 26, 1990 – Suntory Hall, Tokyo, Japan
BRAHMS Symphony No. 2 in D Major, Op. 73
BRAHMS Symphony No. 4 in E Minor, Op. 98
Daniel Barenboim, conductor

April 25, 1990 – Bunka Kaikan, Tokyo, Japan
STRAUSS Till Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks, Op. 28
TAKEMITSU Visions
RAVEL Rapsodie espagnole
RAVEL Pavane pour une infante défunte
RAVEL Alborada del gracioso
RAVEL Boléro
Daniel Barenboim, conductor