Ponti, Michael

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Ponti, Michael

Ponti, Michael , American pianist; b. Freiburg im Breisgau (of American parents), Oct. 29, 1937. He was taken to the U.S. as a child. He studied piano with Gilmour MacDonald; in 1955 he returned to Germany to continue his studies at the Frankfurt am Main Hochschule für Musik. In 1964 he won 1st prize in the Busoni Competition in Bolzano, which launched him on a successful career. In his programs, he specialized in bringing out neglected or forgotten piano masterpieces of the sonorous Romantic past.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire