Riccardo Minasi received his first music lessons from his mother, studying modern violin with Paolo Centurioni and Alfredo Fiorentini. He then turned to the baroque violin and the corresponding repertoire, his teachers in this field being Enrico Parizzi and Luigi Mangiocavallo. He has been active both as a soloist and as concertmaster in numerous ensembles, such as: "Le Concert des Nations" under Jordi Savall, the "Accademia Bizantina", the "Concerto Italiano", with Il Giardino Armonico, the "Concerto Vocale Gent" under René Jacobs, the Collegium 1704 or the "Ensemble 415" under Chiara Banchini. Among the important musicians with whom he has performed are Enrico Onofri, Viktoria Mullova, Albrecht Mayer, Christophe Coin, Sergio Azzolini or Reinhard Goebel. 

He has also worked as a conductor with several renowned ensembles, including the Kammerakademie Potsdam, the Ensemble Resonanz, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, the Balthasar Neumann Ensemble or the "Helsinki Baroque Orchestra", of which he has been 1st Kapellmeister since 2008. In 2007 he founded the chamber music ensemble "Musica Antiqua Roma", with which he performs works of the 17th and 18th century. One focus is on the forgotten Roman composers from this period. Minasi was principal conductor of the ensemble Il pomo d'oro from its founding in 2012 until 2015. The new orchestra won awards with its first recording - Vivaldi's L'imperatore - and in its founding year also edited solo albums by countertenors Max Emanuel Cenčić, Franco Fagioli and Xavier Sabata, as well as an album of Venetian barcarole. Since 2013, the ensemble has made guest appearances in major houses throughout Europe, such as the Theater an der Wien, Paris, Munich, London, St. Petersburg, Zurich and Barcelona. 

In December 2016, Riccardo Minasi was appointed principal conductor of the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, succeeding Ivor Bolton. In September 2018, Minasi began his tenure as "Artist in Residence" of Ensemble Resonanz at Hamburg's Elbphilharmonie for two seasons. This collaboration has since been extended until 2024. Many of the more than 20 CD recordings in which he has participated as a soloist have received record awards. The recording of Heinrich Ignaz Biber's Rosary Sonatas took part as an album in the final round of the Midem Classical Award for 2009. 

Riccardo Minasi has enjoyed an intense musical collaboration with the Orchestra La Scintilla since 2015, which led to his appointment as artistic director in January 2022. Together with La Scintilla he has realized numerous concert projects and, among others, the highly acclaimed CD with the "Four Seasons" by Vivaldi and Verdi. 

see also: www.riccardominasi.com

The cultivation of historical performance practice has been a tradition at Zurich Opera House for many decades. In the 1970s Nikolaus Harnoncourt first caused a national sensation in the field of early music with his Monteverdi cycle; in the 1980s he continued his work at Zurich Opera House together with the director Jean Pierre Ponnelle with Mozart (including Idomeneo, Lucio Silla, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Così fan tutte, Die Zauberflöte, Don Giovanni, Le nozze di Figaro). Harnoncourt did further pioneering work and the musicians of the Zurich Opera Orchestra adapted their playing technique to the latest findings of historical performance practice. From this continuum, the orchestra of the Opera, now the Philharmonia Zurich, evolved into an independent ensemble of first-class specialised musicians, which was able to establish an excellent reputation. The spark that ignited the enthusiasm for new early music gave the ensemble its name: Officially founded in 1998, the ensemble gave itself the name La Scintilla - The Spark. In the years that followed, performances with luminaries of the field such as Nikolaus Harnoncourt, William Christie, Mark Minkowski, Reinhard Goebel, Giuliano Carmignola, Giovanni Antonini and Ottavio Dantone were so successful that the Zurich Opera House has all Baroque operas and, increasingly, works from the Classical period performed by this ensemble. Outside the opera house, La Scintilla regularly performs in the major concert halls and gives concerts with renowned soloists, instrumentalists and singers such as Cecilia Bartoli, Rolando Villazon, Andreas Scholl and others. In 2014, the orchestra received the Echo Klassik Music Prize in the category "Opera Recording of the Year" (19th century) for its recording of Norma with Giovanni Antonini and Cecilia Bartoli. Among the works released on CD and DVD are Mozart arias with Juan Diego Florez, Norma and La sonnambula with Cecilia Bartoli, Orlando and Iphigénie en Tauride with William Christie, Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria with Nikolaus Harnoncourt. Since the 2018/19 season, La Scintilla has been working closely with violinist and conductor Riccardo Minasi on a concert series at Zurich Opera House. The musical arc spans from the early symphonic beginnings in Italy to the great masters of the Baroque, George Frideric Handel and Johann Sebastian Bach, to the sounds of the early Giuseppe Verdi.

Together with the Zürcher Singakademie, La Scintilla also organises the series "Les Concerts", whose main focus is on the sacred repertoire with choir.

see also: Zürcher Singakademie