Born in Liverpool, Nicholas was a chorister at the city’s Metropolitan Cathedral.
He read Modern Languages at Cambridge, and completed postgraduate vocal studies at the Academy.
Since then, he has been in demand across a wide range of repertoire, and with some of the profession’s leading ensembles and directors. He has particularly enjoyed prolonged collaborations with Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Lars Ulrik Mortensen, Richard Tognetti, Emmanuelle Haïm, Laurence Cummings, Jordi Savall and John Butt, and with ensembles including the Britten Sinfonia, Wroclaw Baroque Orchestra, Gabrieli, Les Musiciens du Louvre, BBC Philharmonic and the Dunedin Consort, where he is now Associate Director.
He has appeared at some of the world’s most prestigious halls: Monteverdi's Vespers at Carnegie Hall, Bach's Christmas Oratorio in Sydney Opera House, Bach’s St Matthew Passion at the Thomaskirche in Leipzig, and the St John Passion at the BBC Proms. As a chamber musician, he works regularly with pianists John Reid and Alisdair Hogarth and lutenist Elizabeth Kenny, and has appeared frequently at Wigmore Hall in repertoire from Barbara Strozzi to Stephen Hough, via Schubert and Britten. His discography encompasses music from 1400 to the present day, including Handel, Monteverdi, Michael Finnissy, and Astor Piazzolla’s unique María de Buenos Aires.
As a teacher and coach, Nicholas’s work has taken him to the USA, Poland, Spain and Australia. He teaches at Goldsmiths, University of London, and he has also worked at GSMD, RNCM, and the Universities of York and Cambridge, where he is Associate Director of the University Chamber Choir.