The solo concerto, a vast and important repertory of the early to mid eighteenth century, is known generally only through a dozen concertos by Vivaldi and a handful of works by Albinoni and Marcello. The authors aim to bring this repertory to greater prominence and have, since 1995, been involved in a research programme of scoring and analysing over nine hundred concertos, representing nearly the entire repertory available in early prints and manuscripts. Drawing on this research, they present a detailed study and analysis of the first-movement ritornello form, the central concept that...