Born in Liverpool, Nicholas was a chorister at the city’s Metropolitan Cathedral before studying Modern Languages at Cambridge and voice at the RAM. He has since been in constant demand both in the UK and further afield in a wide range of concert, recital and opera engagements.

He has sung at many of the world’s great concert halls: the Sydney Opera House, Boston Symphony Hall, Carnegie Hall, the Royal Albert Hall, Berlin Philharmonie and the Salzburg Festival.

Nicholas has particularly enjoyed prolonged collaborations with Sir John Eliot Gardiner and EBS, Paul McCreesh and the Gabrieli Consort, Lars-Ulrik Mortensen and Concerto Copenhagen, John Butt and the Dunedin Consort, Andrzej Kosendiak, Stephen Layton and Jordi Savall. He has also sung to critical acclaim with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the St Paul Chamber Orchestra, the OAE, the Brussels, Copenhagen, BBC, Wroclaw and Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestras, Melbourne Symphony, Auckland Philharmonia, and Britten Sinfonia. On the opera stage he has appeared at houses including Paris (Palais Garnier and Opéra Comique), Glyndebourne, Copenhagen’s Kongelige Teater, Opéra de Lille, and the Grand Capitole in Toulouse.

He has sung John Tavener’s Requiem with BBCNOW, Piazzolla’s María de Buenos Aires with Mr McFall’s Chamber (also recorded for Delphian), Berio’s Sinfonia with RLPO, Britten’s Les Illuminations with the Britten Sinfonia in China, Haydn’s Creation with the Royal Northern Sinfonia, Britten’s Serenade with Orquesta del Principado de Asturias, Britten’s Nocturne and Mozart’s Requiem with the Australian Chamber Orchestra.

A committed recitalist, he has appeared regularly at the Wigmore Hall singing a wide range of repertoire including Purcell, both Bach Passions, Schubert, and the complete Britten Canticles. He has sung Janacek’s Diary of One who Vanished for Glyndebourne Festival Opera, for the Philharmonia at the RFH, and as part of the Aurora Janacek Festival, and given recitals at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, and festivals in Maribor, Ludlow, Bath and Orkney. He continues to collaborate with pianists John Reid, Alisdair Hogarth, and lutenists Elizabeth Kenny and Toby Carr.

He has recorded extensively, with credits including a Gramophone Award-winning Messiah and critical acclaim has followed for recordings of Matthäus-Passion, María de Buenos Aires, and projects with Theatre of the Ayre and the English Baroque Soloists. Highlights this season include Bach with the Royal Concertgebouworkest and Finnish Radio Symphony, a curated programme of Bach, Purcell and Silvio Rodríguez with Aurora Orchestra, and Handel with Philharmonia Baroque in the USA.

Nicholas is a Musician in Residence at Girton College, Cambridge, Associate Director of the Dunedin Consort, and a Visiting Professor at the Royal Academy of Music. Outside of making music, he writes about art and music, and avidly follows Liverpool Football Club.