BARENBOIM, DANIEL

BARENBOIM, DANIEL (1942– ), Israeli pianist and conductor. Born in Buenos Aires to parents of Jewish Russian descent, Barenboim started piano lessons at the age of five with his mother, and then with his father, who remained his only other teacher. He gave his first public recital at the age of seven. Further education included Markevich's conducting classes in Salzburg (1954), and studies in Paris and Rome. Barenboim settled in Israel in 1952. Following his British and American debuts (1955, 1957), he toured widely and soon became known as one of the most versatile pianists of his generation. He first conducted in Israel (1962), and from 1965 was active as conductor and soloist with the English Chamber Orchestra. In 1967 Barenboim married the cellist Jacqueline du Pré in Jerusalem. They performed and recorded together in the coming years until her career was tragically cut short by multiple sclerosis. Following his debut as conductor with the New Philharmonia Orchestra (London, 1967), Barenboim was in demand by all the leading European and American symphony orchestras. He conducted opera for the first time at the Edinburgh Festival in 1973, and from 1981 was a regular visitor at the Wagner Bayreuth Festival. He was music director of the Orchestre National de Paris (1975–1989), the Chicago SO (1991), and the Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin (1992). In 2000 the Staatskapelle Berlin appointed him chief conductor for life. He works on a regular basis with the Berlin and the Vienna Philharmonics. Barenboim has always been active as a chamber musician, performing with, among others, perlman , zukerman , and singer Fischer-Dieskau. His numerous recordings include the complete Beethoven sonatas and piano concertos and the Mozart concerti. As a conductor, he has been most successful with scores from the Romantic era. He also championed contemporary works, and in recent years moved into popular and crossover repertory, such as Argentine tango. He provoked an outcry in Israel by defying the country's ban on Wagner, playing the Prelude from Tristan und Isolde with the Berlin Staatskapelle as an encore in concert at the Israel Festival (2001). He has been a prominent advocate of peace in the Middle East. In the early 1990s, he met the Palestinian-born writer and Columbia University professor Edward Said, who shared his vision of peaceful coexistence in the area. This led to Barenboim's first concert on the West Bank, a piano recital at Bir Zeit University. Barenboim and Said established a foundation that promotes music and co-operation through projects targeted at young Arabs and Israelis. They jointly received Spain's Prince of Asturias Concord Prize (2002). Among Barenboim's other honors are the Tolerance Prize (2002) and in 2004 the Buber-Rosenzweig Medal, the Wolf Prize for the Arts, and the Haviva Reik Peace Award. A new version of Barenboim's autobiography, A Life in Music, was published in 2002, as was his book with Said, Parallels and Paradoxes: Explorations in Music and Society. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Grove online; MGG2; Baker's Biographical Dictionary (1997); A. Blyth, "Daniel Barenboim," in: Opera 45 (Aug. 1994), 905–10; H. Kupferberg, "Daniel Barenboim: A 50-Year Career Just Keeps on Growing," in: American Record Guide, 63 (Nov.–Dec. 2000), 6–8. (Naama Ramot (2nd ed.)