Pietro Condorelli is an Italian jazz guitarist born in Milan on January 4, 1962. He holds a diploma in classical guitar and a degree from Rome's DAMS program, and has worked professionally since 1980. By the mid-1980s he had settled in Caserta, just north of Naples, where he has built the rest of his career in and around the city's jazz scene.

In June 1989 he took his own group, the Sonora Art Quartet, on a short U.S. tour organized by the Italian Cultural Institute of New York, and that same year the quartet recorded its debut album, Sonora, in Boston with tenor saxophonist Jerry Bergonzi as a guest. Bergonzi returned for a second session with the group, Sonora Meet Jerry Bergonzi (1994), on which Condorelli was joined by bassist Dario Deidda, drummer Pietro Iodice and trumpeter Marco Sannini. From 1994 to 1996 Condorelli was the guitarist in Area, the Italian progressive-rock and jazz-fusion group founded in Milan in 1972 by singer Demetrio Stratos and drummer Giulio Capiozzo. He joined during the band's 1990s reunion phase, appearing on the live album Chernobyl 7991 (1997) alongside founding members Capiozzo and keyboardist Patrizio Fariselli, and bassist Paolino Dalla Porta, who joined the lineup the same year Condorelli did.

Condorelli's own discography as a leader began with Guitar Style Journey (1996, S.O.S. - Sound On Sound) and continued with Pietro Condorelli Quartet - On My Browser (1998, S.O.S.), featuring pianist Francesco Nastro, bassist Vittorio Pepe and drummer Pietro Iodice. Quasimodo (2000, Red Record) - its title track a Charlie Parker composition - paired him with Nastro, bassist Pietro Ciancaglini, drummer Pietro Iodice and trumpeter Fabrizio Bosso, who returned for Easy (2005, Red Record), recorded in Naples in November 2003 with the same core group expanded to a septet including saxophonists Daniele Scannapieco and Jerry Popolo and trombonist Roberto Schiano. In 2000 he also co-led a trio session, Opening, credited to Condorelli, bassist Stefano Senni and drummer Enzo Carpentieri.

Alongside his own working quartet with Nastro, Condorelli has recorded and performed extensively as a sideman, most often with Naples-area organists and ensembles: multiple albums with organist Vito Di Modugno's various groups between 2007 and 2023, the Orchestra Napoletana di Jazz, and the co-operative group Contemporary Jazz Guitars. He also contributed two compositions, "Wild Cats" and "Sarah's News," to singer Maria Pia De Vito's album Hit The Beast! (1990), on which the guitar chair itself was played by Lello Panico rather than Condorelli. His most recent leader album, Visions (2022, Jazz2 Watch), includes the title track, inspired by the music of Joe Zawinul, and "Notte Che Va," dedicated to the Neapolitan singer-songwriter Pino Daniele. In 2024 he released the trio album Native Language, a set of reworked jazz standards plus one original title track, recorded with bassist Antonio Napolitano and drummer Raffaele Natale and presented that May at his home conservatory in Naples; it is not yet indexed on Discogs (see pietro-condorelli_notes.md).

In 1997 Condorelli won the Musica Jazz "Top Jazz" critics' poll as best new talent, and in 2011 he placed first in the jazz guitar category of the Jazzit Award. He has taught jazz guitar widely across Italy, including stints at the Unlimited Guitar School in Pomigliano d'Arco, the A.N.D.J. school in Naples, the Conservatorio Stanislao Giacomantonio in Cosenza (1994-1997), and Siena Jazz (2000-2015), and he currently holds the jazz guitar chair at the Conservatorio di Musica San Pietro a Majella in Naples, where he has taught since 2000. His students there have included guitarist Eleonora Strino.

Condorelli's playing has been described as slick and fluid, favoring ornate, harmonically dense solo lines built on a bebop foundation. His own catalog spans the modern-mainstream quartet writing of On My Browser, Quasimodo and Easy - all featuring a compact horn section alongside his longtime pianist Francesco Nastro - and a parallel career playing soul-jazz organ-combo dates around Naples, most often with organist Vito Di Modugno. His two spells in high-profile group settings bookend that mainstream base: the free-improvising session work behind Jerry Bergonzi on the Sonora Art Quartet's two albums, and his 1994-1996 tenure in Area, a band whose own roots lie in progressive rock and jazz-fusion rather than straight-ahead jazz. According to his own biography, he has also played short tours or one-off dates across his career with a long list of visiting American and international jazz figures, including Gary Bartz, George Cables, Lee Konitz, Charles Tolliver, Steve La Spina and Jimmy Owens; these are reported here as a career summary rather than individually itemized recording credits (see pietro-condorelli_notes.md).