He began his studies as a double bass and guitar player, becoming a skilled performer of jazz and popular music.Ernesto Schmied, trans. by Yolanda Acker, "Interview: Paolo Pandolfo", Goldberg: The Early Music Portal, p. 5. Ernesto Schmied, trans. by Yolanda Acker, "Interview: Paolo Pandolfo", Goldberg: The Early Music Portal, p. 7. In the mid-late 1970s he studied viola da gamba at the Rome Conservatory. In 1979 he co-founded the early music ensemble La Stravaganza, and then moved to Basel, Switzerland in 1981 where he studied with Jordi Savall at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis. From 1982 to 1990 Pandolfo was a member of Jordi Savall's early music groups Hespèrion XX.
