Poor recital standard

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34097, 8 March 1976, Page 18

Poor recital standard

Neither in programme nor in performance did Michael Ponti’s piano recital in the Town Hall last evening reach a standard hoped for in a festival. The pianists at last year’s festival gave us glowing performances still remembered with gratitude. Both Rosen and Roget would have tilled halls for us this year if the Festival Committee had 1 desired to re-engage a former artist, and who could forget the magic of Tchaikovski’s playing of Bach in recital series? The programme began with Rachmaninov’s Piano Sonata No. 2 in the original, and longer, version. The composer felt that his revised shorter setting suited the materia) better, and in that he

could have been right. Had he excised the lot, I. for one, .would have viewed the de-i privation with equanimity. Mr Ponti is blessed with! strong, flexible, and ex- 1 tremely nimble fingers. Sometimes Rachmaninov’s charac-i teristic filigree writing seemed to be blurred in per-: : formance and lacking in deli-j cacy. As for the heavy) chords, they were hit with) what is known in police reports as “undue force,” causing frequent jangling noises instead of the required ring-, ing tone. Mr Ponti played the second movement with appealing gentleness, and the tone in the hall had a pleasingly lyric quality. The next movement had the vigour of one of those athletic Russian dances wherein limbs fly in all directions, causing pain and injury upon contact.

Scriabin’s Prelude and Noc-i' turne for the Left Hand, Op. 19 was played with poetic charm and with flexibility of 1 Tonal colouring. Three movements from I Stravinsky’s “Petrouchka” were capably played. The • swirl and excitement of the fair, reflective and poetic, thoughtsand feelings, and the' grip of dramatic situations . were brought out in the per- • I formance. Depriving music written for ballet of the colour and movement of the dancing, and reducing what . '■is meant for an orchestra i down to transcription for the 1 piano, causes much to be lost in real effectiveness and meaning. This was not good I “festival” programming. The recital aroused little ' musical satisfaction except for the charming playing of a Chopin encore. —C. Foster Browne.