During the second season, Theodore Thomas and the Chicago Orchestra traveled through Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Their travels also took them out of the United States for the first time for three concerts in Ontario, Canada.

The first Canadian concert was given on December 26 at the Grand Opera House in London, and on December 28 the Orchestra performed at the Grand Opera House in Hamilton. The program for those two concerts featured soprano Agnes Thomson in arias from Dvořák’s Saint Ludmila and Gounod’s Mireille, along with the Orchestra’s principal harp Edmund Schuecker in his Fantasia for Harp. Thomas also led Tchaikovsky’s Suite from The Nutcracker and selections from Moszowski’s Boabdil (most likely the Canadian premieres of both works, since they had just received their U.S. premieres in Chicago with the Orchestra under Thomas on October 22, 1892), Brahms’s Hungarian Dances nos. 17 through 21, Dvořák’s Symphonic Variations, Massenet’s Overture to Phèdre, and Wagner’s Forest Murmurs from Siegfried. The December 27 concert was given at the Pavilion in Toronto and featured composer and pianist Ferruccio Busoni in Liszt’s Second Piano Concerto.

The Orchestra returned to Canada on numerous occasions under Thomas, Frederick Stock, Désiré Defauw, Jean Martinon, and Lawrence Foster, most recently appearing there in May 1976 under Sir Georg Solti.

Image above: Program for the first half of the December 26, 1892, concert at the Grand Opera House in London, Ontario

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