Alessandro Scarlatti

Italian composer (1660–1725)

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Fame57.8
Momentum15.0
Global rank#204
Musicians rank#28
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Lived 1660–1725, aged 65Italy

Italy MusiciansSinger / Musician

Wikipedia
55 languages
Cross-language footprint
Global rank
#204
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Era
1660–1725
Aged 65

Summary

Updated 2026-06-08

He wrote more than six hundred chamber cantatas and reshaped Italian opera into the form that would dominate Europe for a century. His contemporaries called him "the Italian Orpheus" — the architect who gave the aria its final form and invented the three-movement overture that became the blueprint for the symphony.

Biography

About

Pietro Alessandro Gaspare Scarlatti was born on 2 May 1660 in Italy and split his working life between Naples and Rome, composing much of his output for the papal city. He inherited a dramatic tradition from Monteverdi, Cesti, and Cavalli, then pushed it to its limit: he designed the da capo aria that every opera house in Europe would copy, invented the Italian overture in three movements, and developed the four-part sonata that prefigured the string quartet. Handel studied his theatrical music closely and carried its influence forward. Scarlatti moved fluently across every genre of his era —…

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