Born in Gorizia, he graduated in composition from the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory in Milan. He also attended advanced courses at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena and the Scuola Civica in Milan. In 1991 he moved to Paris to study the new technologies at ircam, with which he later collaborated as ‘compositeur en recherche’ (1993–95). After a series of successes at international competitions in Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Graz, Milan, Stockholm and Siena (First Prize at the Casella Competition in 1989), Romitelli’s music was frequently performed at such prestigious festivals as Musica in Strasbourg, Présences of Radio France, Ars Musica in Brussels, the seasons of ircam-InterContemporain, the Venice Biennale, and Milano Musica, and by ensembles and orchestras including Ictus, L’Itinéraire, Court-Circuit, InterContemporain, Musiques Nouvelles, ensemble recherche, Alter Ego, the rai National Symphony Orchestra and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin. He received commissions from the French Ministry of Culture, Musiques Nouvelles, Ictus, Radio France, ircam, the Gulbenkian Foundation and the Festival in Royaumont.
Struck down by a fatal illness, Fausto Romitelli died in Milan on 27 June 2004 at the age of 41.

Selected works: Kü for 14 performers (1989), Natura morta con fiamme for string quartet and electronics (1991), EnTrance for soprano, ensemble and electronics (1995), Domeniche alla periferia dell’impero. Prima domenica for four instruments (1995–96), The Nameless City for orchestra (1997), Professor Bad Trip: Lessons I–III for instrumental ensemble and electronics (1998–2000), Blood on the Floor, Painting 1986 for instrumental ensemble (2000), Domeniche alla periferia dell’impero. Seconda domenica: hommage ą Gérard Grisey for four instruments (2000), Flowing down too slow for orchestra and live electronics (2001), Amok Koma for strings, percussion and electronics (2001), Dead City Radio. Audiodrome for orchestra (2003), An Index of Metals, video-opera to texts by Kenka Lekovich (2003).

At the centre of my composing lies the idea of considering sound as
a material into which one plunges in order to forge its physical and perceptive characteristics: grain, thickness, porosity, luminosity, density and elasticity. Hence it is sculpture of sound, instrumental synthesis, anamorphosis, transformation of the spectral morphology, and
a constant drift towards unsustainable densities, distortions and interferences, thanks also to the assistance of electro-acoustic technologies. And increasing importance is given to the sonorities of non-academic derivation and to the sullied, violent sound of a prevalently metallic origin of certain rock and techno music.

Fausto Romitelli