Guido Ponzini was born on April 21st 1985 in Manerbio, Italy.

At the age of sixteen he started the study of electric bass, graduating at CPM in Milano. He is attending the Viola da Gamba course by Master Roberto Gini at the conservatory A. Boito in Parma, Italy, and also studied “Experimental and Contemporary Composition” with Master Luca Tessadrelli.

In 2005 he started to play Chapman Stick, developing a very personal and variegate approach, He also plays silicon bass, a short-scale fretless electric bass with silicon strings. As bass, viola da gamba and stick player he worked with many world music artists like Ayub Ogada, Adel Salameh, Naziha Azzouz and Vladimir Denissenkov, performing in importants events and festivals.
With Shan Qi, featuring Peter Gabriel’s flute player Guo Yue and Giovanni Amighetti, they developed live performances in which the traditional instruments are merged with new technologies like the NDS software Electroplankton created by Toshio Iwai.The project released a dvd featuring artists as Guo Yue, Helge Andreas Norbakken, Wu Fei and Guido Ponzini. Dvd is produced by Giovanni Amighetti. Sound engineer: Bruno Cimenti. “Shan Qi DVD”, published by Ozella Music, has been nominated for"Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik".

“Twilight Town: a musical journey through memories of an imaginary world” is his solo debut album in which he presents original compositions written by him and G. Amighetti for stick, silicon and electric bass, featuring Guo Yue and italian singer Luisa Cottifogli as special guests.The cd is published by the german label OZELLA MUSIC

His second solo album is the first classical contemporary concerto ever written for Chapman Stick and string quartet, recorded with musicians from Ennio Morricone orchestra, Roma Sinfonietta. Published by the american label Porter Records, “Plugin Contemporary Music and Ponzini plays Uematsu” features also six pieces of the japanese composer Nobuo Uematsu played by Guido on viola da gamba, from the Final Fantasy soundtracks.

He collaborated with Nintendo Europe, IK Multimedia, Lomography, working on the interaction between music and new technologies.

As composer he writes music for theater, television, multimedia, videogames.

He recorded viola da gamba for Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood soundtrack, written by award-winning composer Jesper Kyd and also featuring sound-designer Diego Stocco.

QUOTES

“For me, this is one of the most astonishing releases of recent months. Guido Ponzini, who I hadn’t heard of before and who looks like a teenager in the booklet’s photos (but should really be in his twenties), has recorded an absolute stunner of 13 self-composed pieces and six recordings of pieces composed by Nobuo Uematsu. (...). Ponzini’s approach, his insistence on an instruments proper, “good” sound, as well as on classical composition, could be called old-fashioned. But, really, what the heck.”

JAN-ARNE SOHNS (Foxy Digitalis)

“Se volete divertirvi ad ascoltare bella musica contemporanea per archi rivolgetevi a Guido Ponzini. Plugin Contemporary Music/Ponzini plays Uematsu fa per voi. Le tredici tracce che compongono "Plugin Contemporary Music" rappresentano un vero e proprio racconto - a cui curiosamente manca un titolo - che si snoda su tredici diverse brevi scene, i cui singoli titoli danno tuttavia ottime indicazioni per rappresentare con immagini quanto la musica crea in astratto.

Il quartetto (non strutturato) che ruota in scena è composto dallo stesso Guido Ponzini (che alterna chitarra ad otto corde a chapman stick, viola da gamba e contrabbasso), dalla bravissima violinista Angela Benelli, dal contrabbassista Jean Gambini e dal chitarrista Bruno Cimenti coadiuvato da Giovanni Amighetti per la parte live electronics.

Diversissime invece le sei tracce che compongono "Ponzini plays Uematsu," nelle quali Ponzini interpreta brevi tracce composte dal compositore Nobuo Uematsu. Il clima narrativo delle composizioni di Ponzini pare esteso anche a Uematsu che viene interpretato soprattutto con la viola da gamba.

Gioia, un certo incedere da narrazione epico-cavalleresca, grande capacità esecutiva caratterizzano i suoni di questo lavoro a due facce, ma ad una sola, piacevole, dimensione musicale.”

FRANCESCA ODILIA BELLINO - All About Jazz

“The sound in Ponzini’s Terra Aria (Sollima composition)  is heavily geared toward the bowed and pizzicato bass lines.The gamba gives the composition a new dimension

(...)

Winterwind, another brilliant composition and video clip from Guido Ponzini (YouTube, Ghigo85, 6 mins11 secs). The subtle layering of sound, now plucked now bowed, adds considerably to the creation of a chilling yet bracing feeling, evoking the winter wind of the title. Ponzini clearly understands the historical legacy of a soaring melodic line over a dark, plucked bass, drawn from viol and theorbo, as well as the ‘modal’ scale motifs well-suited to the instrument. He doesn’t try for the jagged harmonic changes in Sollima’s Terra Aria, relying instead on texture, though obviously in terms of length and breadth it evokes Sollima. He speaks directly though to our generation through hints of Japanese koto and innocent Japanese melody. He too matches the plucked viol to the instrument’s strong links with the lute. Ponzini is creating music peculiar to his time and ours. The YouTube ‘performance space’ is special to our time, the string sound deeply embedded in our consciousness as characterful and important, from the medieval to the present. The ‘moving picture’ medium is as important to us as was Perotin’s reliance on the architecture of Notre-Dame.It goes without saying that I look forward to more of Ponzini working with this instrument, in this medium.

ROD BYATT - Viola da Gamba Weblog

“I raffinati colori impiegati – chapman stick e viola da gamba in primis – mettono in luce un percorso di soluzioni formali che fa perno sulla suggestione, più nel concreto sull’intelligente alternanza di pieni e di vuoti, sul gioco delle parti, sull’eleganza impalpabile delle voci. Niente trucco, niente inganno: il fascino di questa prova composita – frutto degli studi e delle collaborazioni del nostro, accompagnato nello specifico da Angela Benelli e Jean Gambini – sta esattamente in questa sommessa e al contempo vibrante ricerca.”

BUONE FREQUENZE - “Plugin Contemporary Music” review

“It’s evident to me that Guido Ponzini has the blessing of good taste,which will always carry him through, whatever he does.
In this case, it’s Stick solos, duos and trios after
just over one year of playing the instrument (impressive).
His good taste shows up in the simplicity and perfection of concept and execution, not over-reaching. No need to.”

EMMET CHAPMAN - musician, Stick inventor and president of Stick Enterprises

“”A big surprise was the introduction of the Mari Boine Band’s concert, during St.Patrick’s Festival organized from the Folk Club of Buttrio: just arrived from “Jazzahead” in Bremen, Germany, the young (21 y.o) and extraordinary Guido Ponzini played in the “Garzoni” Theatre for a short set with his“Chapman Stick”, with incredible technique, that shows Ponzini as an extraordinary interpreter, according to the opinion of its inventor, Mister Chapman himself. With a nearly clavicembalistic sonority, the first piece was a test of remarkable counterpoint agility, while the second remembered an ancient charming dance, preparing the atmosphere for Mari Boine’s world…

Giuliano Almerigogna - “Il Messaggero Veneto”

“Mari Boine’s concert has been opened by the phenomenal 21y.o. stick-player Guido Ponzini, who already played here during the Guitar Festival in September with chinese artists, who also recently released his first solo cd “Twilight Town”: a talent with classical background who, with his instrument, can be poet and virtuoso at the same time, thanks to his music which is between jazz, prog and chamber music.”

Sandra Mansutti -  “Il Gazzettino Online”

“Makes the Chapman stick sound as easy to learn as a recorder in kindergarten. There is a point where incredible technical savvy and the ability to touch listener’s heart in a very simple and direct way converge. Whenever that happens, you know you have something special and that is why it doesn’t take the ever-active Dagobert Böhm (who acted as an executive producer to “Twilight Town”) nor Emmet Chapman (who invented the “stick” named after him, which sets the album’s tone) to tell us that Guido Ponzini is made of extremely promising material.

Tobias Fischer - Tokafi

“Even though he is very young (°1985) and seems like he just recently started playing the Chapman stick, it is immediately clear that he masters the instrument.Especially on “Rainstorm upon the harbour” which sounds like incredible masterly play of an almost classical composition.

Psychevanhetfolk

Twilight Town proves there’s a good deal of virtuosity possible with it. The young Italian experimentalist bass player really explores the possibilities for the stick, electric and silicon bass, as well as combining it with some familiar, traditionally beautiful sounds such as the flute, with often atonal jarring electronic noise.This is his first solo album, although he has been seen supporting artists such as Vladimir Denissenkov, Guo Yue, Ayub Ogada, Adel Salameh and Naziha Azzouz.The scratches and fascinating rhythms of ‘Hammers upon the coal mine’ are vastly pretentious, as the Vaiesque guitars plough the outer reaches of the prog-jazz spectrum, but it’s an album of extremes, and the highs are worth bearing with the experimental and introspective elements.Flautist Guo Yue provides some of the album’s highlights, on ‘Little dances for a Siamese cat’, which is a gem in itself and really provides a foil for Ponzini in his deceptively simple style.

Wyl Menmuir - FLY REVIEWS UK

On his Chapman Stick Ponzini reflects the pastel colors of nature just awakening from winter. Balm for the soul.

Global-mojo