PONTI, MICHAEL Michael Ponti, piano
Michael Ponti's extensive recording activity and world-wide
concert appearances as soloist, chamber music player (The Trio Ponti-Zimansky-Polasek
was founded in 1977) and Lieder accompanist, including a Deutsche Grammophon
recording of songs by Charles Ives with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, have established
him as one of the most important pianists of his time.
Since 1968 an output of more than 80 records, including the
complete works of Tchaikovsky, Scriabin and Rachmaninoff has received world-wide
critical acclaim. High Fidelity Magazine was prompted to refer to him as "Ten
pianists in one" and Germany's Fono Forum, Tokyo's Musica Viva and New
York's FM Guide among others, featured him on their covers.
Hundreds of concerts and return engagements have made his art
and name familiar to audiences in the great cities of the world: New York, London,
Berlin, Paris, Vienna, Warsaw, Moscow, Rome, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, etc.
Ponti, who was born on October 29, 1937, studied piano from
1942 to 1955 in Washington D.C. with Professor Gilmour McDonald.
From 1955 to 1961 he continued his studies in Frankfurt with
Professor Erich Flensch.
In the early sixties Ponti won prizes in most of the important
international piano competitions, including the coveted first prize Busoni award
in Italy in 1964. Soon after that he made a memorable Vienna debut playing five
performances of Bartok's 2nd concerto (Wolfgang Sawallisch conducting) to a
raving press and public.
After Michael Ponti's sensational sold-out New York debut in
1972 Life Magazine, Time Magazine and the New York Times all agreed that a major
pianist, one of the most striking and original of his era, had burst upon the
international scene.
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