Erin Ponto is a versatile and dynamic harpist, equally at home performing solo music, chamber music, and orchestral repertoire. She is currently a Performance Certificate candidate at Northwestern University as well as Adjunct Lecturer in harp at The University of Indiana at South Bend.
Ms. Ponto is a harpist at Lyon & Healy’s world-renowned harp factory, and repeatedly performs on every new instrument that is produced to listen to the sound quality before it is sold.
Ms. Ponto holds a Master of Music degree from Northwestern University, where she studied with the Chicago Lyric Opera’s principal harpist and esteemed pedagogue Elizabeth Cifani. She received a Bachelor of Music at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music where she studied with internationally acclaimed soloist Yolanda Kondonassis. Ms. Ponto was fortunate to attend two summers near the end of the Salzedo Harp Colony in Camden, Maine, where was a student of the legendary Alice Chalifoux. Prior teachers have included Marcia Dickstein, Paula Page, Joan Holland, and Pam Weest-Carrasco.
Erin’s orchestral experience has included performances under the batons of imminent conductors and composers, including Sir Simon Rattle, Steven Smith, Johnny Mandel, and Edwin Outwater. She is an alumna of the International Festival-Institute at Round Top, the Pierre Monteux School, and the final session of the Henry Mancini Institute.
As a supporter of new music, she has premiered orchestral works by George S. Clinton, Greg D’Allesio, Jason Eckardt, Lewis Nielson, and Laurence Rosenthal, among others. Her solo playing in featured on filmmaker Sean Gill’s works Crescendo and Regrets of the Rainy Traveler.
Beyond the sphere of performance, Erin is an experienced teacher has been a harp assistant at the Interlochen Arts Camp. She is passionate about innovatively adapting diverse music for the instrument, and has transcribed hundreds of works that range from Bach to Scott Joplin to classic rock to collegiate fight songs. She composes both pedagogical works geared to complement preexisting literature for beginning and intermediate students, as well as crossover solo and chamber works that seek to blend classical, folk, and modal elements.
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