After briefly living in New York City, he accepted the role as head of the piano department at the St. Louis Institute of Music, and settled with his wife in the suburb of Clayton.

[8] Sirota's talent, personality, and appearance helped him quickly gain acceptance into Viennese musical society of the time, which opened professional and social connections for him.

Ethel Burket, a correspondent for the Nebraska State Journal, wrote about the reception that met Sirota's performance of Busoni's "perfectly stupendous" concerto: At the end such a pandemonium broke forth and the whole audience seemed carried away to the point of madness.

[...] I tried to study it by myself, but was glad when Leo Sirota, the pianist, took pity on me and sacrificed many hours of his holiday to coaching me in the extraordinarily difficult part of which Strauss himself had said jokingly to me that he scarcely believed it would be learned.

One wrote that Sirota's "virtuosity, passionate temperament, and engaging personality" had "literally taken Berlin by storm"; another called him a "master" and wondered in his review, "Do Russians have a monopoly on pianism?"

Sirota's success in Berlin led to engagements across Europe; in concerts conducted by Busoni, Koussevitzky, Horenstein, Carl Nielsen, and Bruno Walter.

Ferruccio Busoni's death at the age of fifty-eight (in 1924), was a blow not only to all of those who today remember him with great esteem and deep affection, but to the entire world of music which will be forever indebted to him.

According to Yamamoto Takashi, the public's excitement for Sirota's debut dovetailed with the celebratory mood in Japan at the time over the succession of the Emperor Shōwa, which had occurred on November 10.

[42] On November 17 the Asahi Shimbun published a review by Ushiyama wherein he praised Sirota for having "literally conquered the music world of Tokyo", which no previous touring pianist had accomplished.

His choice, unprecedented for visiting Western artists at the time, resulted in Nippon Gakki widely advertising his endorsement; he is credited with helping to popularize Yamaha pianos.

[47] The deteriorating political situation in Europe, particularly the strong showing of the NSDAP in the 1930 German federal election, convinced the Sirotas to settle in Japan permanently.

[60] In 1936, while on his final European tour before World War II, Sirota told journalists: When I visited [Japan] for the first time, I didn't expect things to be of a particularly high level, but I have had some unbelievably wonderful surprises there.

In November of the same year, the Japan-Germany Cultural Agreement (Japanese: 日独文化協定, romanized: Nichidoku Bunka Kyōtei), which commemorated the Anti-Comintern Pact of 1936, was signed.

[69] Policy changes that resulted from the agreement included discouraging inviting anymore people of Jewish descent to Japan, excepting those considered "especially useful [...] such as capitalists and technicians".

[76] When the Tatsuta Maru approached San Francisco on July 24, its crew learned that they would not be allowed to dock because of fraught diplomatic tensions between the United States and Japan, as well as an embargo on a shipment of Japanese silk that was aboard.

[75] Although the Los Angeles Times announced in September that Sirota planned to settle in the United States,[80] his daughter said he refused to do so, citing what he had heard through his connections to top Japanese government officials, who had relayed to him that war was unlikely.

With the first bars of the programmed Scarlatti the cognoscenti sat up tense, for the soloist gave immediate notice that those present were in for an afternoon of piano playing which must rank A No.

There was poetry in his conception, singing quality in the tone, a suborning sweetness in the delicate, intimate passages, and a red-blooded aggressiveness [...] which bespoke the artist of major caliber.

Mr. Sirota's sensitivity to the melodic line, so often lost by less qualified performers [...] held his audience engrossed in rapt attention, carried along in a musical experience rarely offered under these circumstances.

[95] Sirota maintained a busy performing and teaching schedule,[98] playing in public until January 1944, when he appeared on the same Japan Symphony Orchestra program as harpsichordist Eta Harich-Schneider.

[101] When Koiso Kuniaki succeeded Tōjō Hideki as Prime Minister in July 1944, his new cabinet ordered all foreign residents to evacuate to designated areas in Karuizawa, officially for their protection.

[107] Sirota recalled one such episode in a 1954 interview with Theatre Arts: I soon became resigned to [being regularly visited by the Tokkō] and I was only mildly annoyed when two young government agents appeared at the door.

That day coincided with the atomic bombing of Hiroshima; a Swiss diplomat privately disclosed the news to Sirota, adding that the end of the war was imminent.

[113] On November 17, 1945, Sirota performed his first postwar concert: a program of music by Busoni, Franz Liszt, and Carl Maria von Weber, conducted by Joseph Rosenstock.

[124]Japan's destruction and economic hardships, changing attitudes towards musical performance, and his daughter's forthcoming marriage were all determinative factors in Sirota's decision.

He commanded a powerful tone, employed a wide range of dynamics, and made a free use of the sustaining and the damper pedals in obtaining coloristic effects.

His program notes are his last published writings; he died shortly before Sirota arrived:[153] The Japanese music world would like to warmly welcome Maestro's visit back to Japan.

He later wrote in the Mainichi Shimbun: After [Sirota's] absence from Japan for the last 16 years, he held only one concert in Hibiya Public Hall, and his fans warmly welcomed this young man in his seventies.

After the concert, he told the press that being recognized for his importance in Japanese musical history and watching his students' performances gave him the "happiest time" in his "long life".

[159] He also said that he was proud that young pianists in Japan had reached a level of skill equal to their peers anywhere else in the world and noted that the enrichment of musical culture was comparable to that of the United States.