(b Verona, 22 April 1658; d Bologna, 8 Feb 1709). Italian composer. He studied with Perti in Bologna and in 1686 joined the S Petronio orchestra as a violinist; he also played the viola and tenor viol there, but his reputation was as a violin virtuoso. In 1696-9 he was at the Ansbach court, briefly as maestro di concerto. He then went to Vienna before returning to Bologna, where he was a S Petronio violinist again from 1701.
Torelli composed some 150 instrumental works and contributed significantly to the development of the concerto grosso and solo concerto. His first four printed collections (1686-8) are all of chamber music, but they show experimental steps towards concerto scoring and ritornello form. These features are more pronounced in his many pieces (entitled variously ‘sinfonia’, ‘concerto’ and ‘sonata’) for trumpet and strings, mostly written for S Petronio before 1696. In later works Torelli arrived at a mature concerto style: his last collection (1709) consists of three-movement concerti grossi and solo violin concertos, with clearcut ritornello forms and relatively simple textures. He also wrote an oratorio and a few other vocal works.
