Bruce Dickey is one of a handful of musicians worldwide who have dedicated themselves to reviving the cornetto - once an instrument of great virtuosi, but which lamentably fell into disuse in the 19th century. The revival began in the 1950s, but it was largely Bruce Dickey, who, from the late 1970s, created a new renaissance of the instrument, allowing the agility and expressive power of the cornetto to be heard once again. His many students in over 40 years of teaching at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, have helped to consolidate and elevate the status of this once forgotten instrument. For his achievements the Historic Brass Society awarded him in 2000 the prestigious Christopher Monk Award for "his monumental work in cornetto performance, historical performance practice and musicological scholarship." In 2007 he was honored by British conductor and musicologist Andrew Parrott with a “Taverner Award” as one of 14 musicians whose “significant contributions to musical understanding have been motivated by neither commerce nor ego.”

In the course of his long career as a performer and recording artist he has worked with most of the leading figures in the field of early music, including the legendary pioneers of historically informed perfomance, Gustav Leonhardt, Frans Brüggen and Nikolaus Harnoncourt. He was a member for over ten years of Jordi Savall’s Hesperion XX, and has frequently and repeatedly collaborated with Ton Koopman, Monica Huggett, Philippe Herreweghe and many others. Of special importance has been his long-time friendship and collaboration with Andrew Parrott, and in more recent years with Konrad Junghänel. In 1987, together with trombonist Charles Toet, he founded the ensemble Concerto Palatino, dedicated to all music written for their instruments. With the group they toured the world extensively and made dozens of trailblazing recordings.

Bruce Dickey can be heard on countless recordings. His solo CD (Quel lascivissimo cornetto) on Accent with the ensemble Tragicomedia was awarded the Diapason d’or and was chosen in 2017 by Diapason Magazine as one of the 100 best CDs of Baroque Music of the past half century. Beginning in 2011, he has begun a new series of recordings for the Belgian label Passacaille, including a new solo album called La Bella Minuta, and four CDs together with Czech soprano Hana Blažíková. Struck by the affinity of her voice and the cornetto, the two of them have collaborated on five CDs, partly together with Concerto Palatino, and formed a new ensemble called The Breathtaking Collective, focussing on the affinity of their “voices”.

In addition to performing, Bruce is much in demand as a teacher, both of the cornetto and of seventeenth-century performance practice. In addition to his 40 years as teacher of cornetto and chamber music at the Schola Cantorum he has taught at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, and the Early Music Institute at Indiana University, as well as master classes in the United States, Canada, Europe and Japan. He is also active in research on performance practice, and has published, together with Michael Collver, a catalog of the surviving cornetto repertoire, and, together with trumpeter Edward Tarr, a book on historical wind articulation. In 1997, together with his wife Candace Smith, he founded Artemisia Editions, a small publishing house which produces editions of music from 17th-century Italian convents.

In 1981, Bruce moved to Italy, partly to be closer to the origins and source materials for his instrument and its music. He currently lives with his wife, the singer Candace Smith, in a country house outside of Bologna, home of the original Concerto Palatino.