In 1817 he had his first success as a dancer performing Osvaldo e Olfrida by Giuseppe Sorrentino at the Teatro San Benedetto in Venice.
In the following years he also started to practise as a choreographer, especially in Lisbon and, to a lesser extent, also in Oporto, in Vienna, and in Russia, but with less success; performances of Belisario and Gli esiliati in Siberia (1831) by Gaetano Donizetti, and La muette de Portici by Daniel Auber (1838) were warmly received by critics and audience.
He was premier danseur of both Italian and Portuguese dancers at the Royal Theatre of Saint John in Lisbon until the season 1839–40, which was a complete failure for Astolfi.
He experienced other failures in Crema and Bergamo in 1837 and at the Teatro Carignano in Turin in 1842.
He was the composer and choreographer of La Encantadora de Madrid, performed in the season 1845–46 at the Teatro Regio in Turin, starring Fanny Cerrito and Arthur Saint-Léon.