A paean to Ponti

[chill319]

I enjoyed these notes and remembrances of pianist Michael Ponti, an early champion of unsung composers (and still alive, I believe). I thought you might enjoy them, too, and my friend gave his okay to share them.

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Ponti was, along with Earl Wild and others, a hero of my youth.
And he always will be one of my personal heroes.

In the 70s and early 80s I went to any concert by him I could.
In one concert he played the whole "Hammerklavier" as an encore......Totally insane........

He had T-shirts to sell, on which you could read
"Ponti- Power" or "Ponti-Fex"...........

He is a somehow tragical person, who never had the chance to be [considered] one of the greatest -- though for me and others, he actually is.
I remember a 1978 WDR interview with him, and I also remember my conversation with him in 1996 after he played a concert with us.
Afterwards we drank a lot. He was very sad about the way his career had gone. As in the WDR interview, he said that he had no chance [had not had the right opportunities].

Vox told him: "We want the complete Rachmaninov solo piano works."
And he said "ok."

Vox told him then: "Next we want the complete Scriabin."
At this moment - he told me - he became nervous.
But he said "ok."

And then Vox said to him: "The first recording we want to do is the Henselt concerto."
Then he knew it would be a very tough time for him.

And he was willing to play any gig you could imagine. Take a summer holiday in Sylt, for example, 30 years ago.
The local Kurorchester wanted to play Brahms Piano concerto No.1.
Ponti appeared and played it on a little piano, a "Stutzflügel."

He had memorized over 50 concertos. In 1996 he played the Liszt 2nd Concerto with us.
During rehearsal he had only a small "Taschenpartitur", a very old one, his own.
But he did not need it. He knew all the markings and numbers by heart.

Kudos.
He was a 150% old school professional.
Even in rehearsal he made no mistakes.
He sat at the piano, making no unnecessary motions, and just played.
That demeanor is, of course, rather unlike some of our stars nowadays.

And he played beautifully and -- of course -- powerfully.
What a sound.
Ponti-Power!

He was often recorded unfaithfully, with bad Instruments and under bad circumstances.
He did his job all the time.

That said, I have a Rachmaninov and Prokofiev 3rd Concerto from the 90s that seems produced very well and that sounds very good.
It is played with great character, intensity and verve on a very good Steinway.
And the recording is state of the art.
This is Ponti at his best.
Sadly this CD is out of print.

Rach 3 with Ponti I have dreamed about for decades.
But it exists!

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Some of these anecdotes seem to suggest that Ponti wanted more opportunities to be heard in standard repertoire. (Which of course doesn't mean that he stinted on his preparations for Henselt et alia.)

[Alan Howe]

He was often recorded unfaithfully, with bad Instruments and under bad circumstances.

That's the major problem with his recordings.

[jimsemadeni]

I bought every Michael Ponti Candide/Vox LP I could find, agree the orchestras sometime not up his talent, but otherwise we might not even know about some of the composers whose music he played. I can listen to a poor recording if there is no other way to hear a piece that interests me.

[Alan Howe]

Agreed. The irony is that many of those pieces have since been re-recorded with first-class orchestras and conductors, but sometimes without soloists of the individual stamp of Ponti.

[John_Boyer]

Ponti and the New York Times, 1 of 4

January 30, 1972, Page 27.  Howard Klein discusses Ponti's forthcoming marathon New York debut, reviews Ponti's recordings of Rachmaninoff, comparing them unfavorably to Horowitz.

https://www.nytimes.com/1972/01/30/archives/michael-ponti-brash-dash-and-bravado-brash-dash-and-bravado.html
--

Ponti and the New York Times, 2 of 4

March 15, 1972, Page 52.  Raymond Ericson reviews Ponti's full-house, three hour long, nine encore (including the Scriabin 5th Sonata) Alice Tully Hall debut.  Notes Ponti's tendency to play things extraordinarily fast.

https://www.nytimes.com/1972/03/15/archives/a-recital-is-given-by-ponti-pianist-artist-plays-nine-encores-in.html
--

Ponti and the New York Times, 3 of 4

December 16, 1974, Page 48.  Allen Hughes reviews Ponti's recital at Hunter College of Haydn, Chopin, Brahms, and Rachmaninoff.  Notes Ponti's remarkable virtuosity, remarks on the unusual encores, and discusses his premier performance of a newly commissioned sonata by Iain Hamilton (1922-2000).

https://www.nytimes.com/1974/12/16/archives/ponti-plays-iain-hamilton-piano-work.html
--

Ponti and the New York Times, 4 of 4

February 28, 1978, Page 27.  Harold Schonberg reviews Ponti's all-sonata program at Alice Tully Hall consisting of Scarlatti, Chopin (#3 in B minor), Scriabin (#4 in F-sharp), and Rachmaninoff (#2 in B-flat minor).  Complains of Ponti's thin tone, saying it tends to bang rather than sound full.  Complements him, however, on his correct phrasing of the Chopin, as well as his use of inner voices.

https://www.nytimes.com/1978/02/28/archives/recital-sonata-evening-by-ponti.html

[John_Boyer]

I am a great admirer of Ponti, too.  He tackled works that no one in those days would look at, and gave to them a level of excitement that few have subsequently matched.  For all their faults, the Ponti recordings are still my favorites for the concertos of Raff, Reinecke, Hiller, and many others.

[Alan Howe]

They're not mine. Great pianism's not enough in concerto recordings...

[adriano]

I am a great admirer of Michael Ponti too and had once all of his Vox-Turnmabout LPs. His complete Tchaikovsky, Scriabin and Rachmaninov solo recordings still fascinate me, they were the first ones I bought on CDs. I compared those solo achievements many times with recordings by other pianists, but always came back to Ponti's. Of course, there are exciting recordings by his peers, as, for example, the Scriabin sonatas by Szidon and Ugorski are concerned. Szidon's are an incredible achievement - and as crazy one like Ponti's.
I must say, that the Raff and the Moszkowski Concertos are also my favorites; such a pity the Raff is not complete and the orchestra is inferior.

[Alan Howe]

such a pity the Raff is not complete and the orchestra is inferior.

...and there's the problem in a nutshell. These aren't historic performances in the usual sense of the word; they're just poorly prepared (i.e. often incomplete) and poorly presented (i.e. not even engineered to the best standards of the day and featuring sub-standard accompaniments). I appreciate that they were pioneering recordings, but they could have been done so much better - as Hyperion have since shown. So, a paean to Ponti, but a raspberry to the editors, engineers and orchestras.

[adriano]

I just re-listened to the Moszkowski-Ponti once again. It is certainly an exception: it's the very complete score - I followed on the first score edition (1898) from my collection - and very well played by the orchestra (the Philharmonia Hungarica was a good one). It's also excellently conducted and well engineered; I have the impression that it was very well prepared in all its aspects!

[John_Boyer]

I have listened to his Raff and Rubinstein 4, score in hand, and they are both complete.  (Funny, but I listened to his Moszkowski at breakfast this morning, too.)

I have one volume of the Tchaikovsky solo music, but I never got the other because I never felt much affinity for his piano music.  Scriabin and Rachmaninoff are another matter, however.  I shall have to track them down.  I think, too, I was afraid of encountering Vox's annoying habit of splitting large scale works over two discs, like they did for their Rachmaninoff symphonies (Op. 13 and first half of Op. 27 on disc one, Op. 44 and second half of Op. 27 on disc two) and Brahms piano quartets.

It's a pity Joanna Nickrenz began her work with Vox only after many of the Ponti discs had already been made.  I remember the first time I heard one.  Suddenly, instead of sounding like an historical recording in stereo, we had a Vox LP that was sonically competitive with RCA and Decca.

[Alan Howe]

Well, I'm listening to Ponti's Moszkowski and I'm afraid that to me the piano sounds thin and splashy - and is placed too far forward in the aural image. The orchestra play well, I agree, but I've heard far better from orchestral recordings made in 1969: too often the sound becomes crowded, even rather hard on the ears. Compare this to, for example, the quality of sound EMI/HMV were giving Emil Gilels a full decade previously in his Beethoven concerto recordings. There's just no comparison. No: if I want to enjoy this concerto, give me the far greater subtlety of Piers Lane and the beautifully engineered and sensitive accompaniment of the BBCSSO under Jerzy Maksimiuk every time.

However, I know how subjective all this is. I didn't grow up with Ponti as I didn't know much about this repertoire until the Hyperion RPC series was well under way in the nineties. To each his own...

[kolaboy]

Love his recording of Hiller's op.69 concerto - especially the finale.

[Alan Howe]

Well, I'll take the great Howard Shelley every time. And his Tasmanian orchestra - magnificent.

[adriano]

@ John_Boyer
You must have a strange score of the Raff! Ponti's recording has really a lot of cuts. His Andante, for example, takes 7:25 and all other pianists need 3 minutes more (Antonioli 10:59, Cooper 10:05, Aronsky 11:23, NGuyen 11:07) - and this has nothing to do because Ponti sometimes takes faster tempi. It's really, and unpardonably cut. Not to speak about the remaining movements!