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The English soprano, Rachel Nicholls, read French and Linguistic Science at the University of York, and then studied at the Royal College of Music with Kathleen Livingstone. At the RCM, she won the President’s Rose Bowl for the Most Outstanding Student of the Year, the Cuthbert Smith Prize, the Lies Askonas Prize and the Van Someren Godfrey Prize for English Song.
One of the most outstanding young sopranos recently to have emerged in the UK, Rachel Nicholls combines a warm lyric voice with outstanding musicianship and command of several languages. She is equally at home in opera, oratorio or recital. She made her Royal Opera debut in December 2001 as Flowermaiden in Parsifal under Sir Simon Rattle and returned as Pepik in The Cunning Little Vixen under Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Prilepa in The Queen of Spades under Valery Gergiev and Echo in Ariadne auf Naxos under Antonio Pappano and Sir Colin Davis (for the revival). She created Philippa in John Browne’s Babette’s Feast for the Royal Opera House at the Linbury Studio Theatre. She has also sung Theophano in Ottone and Metella in Silla at the London Handel Festival, the title role in Handel’s Susanna with the Early Opera Company, Bella in Who Put Bella in the Wych Elm? for Almeida Opera, Junon Platée (TCC Productions, Lisbon), Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni for Mid-Wales Opera, and Tatyana in Eugene Onegin for Scottish Opera Go Round. Last year she made her main-house debut for Scottish Opera as Florain The Knot Garden to widespread critical acclaim. and has since returned to play Frasquita in Carmen. She recently appeared as Erismena title role and Elisa in Tolomeo in English Touring Opera's Baroque Season.
Rachel Nicholls possesses a considerable concert and oratorio repertoire. She has sung with the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, The Hanover Band, the London Handel Orchestra, the London Mozart Players and the Orchestra of St John’s, Smith Square, and at the Brighton's Fishguard, Gloucester's Three Choirs, London Handel and Presteigne Festivals and at and at Bath Abbey, St James's Piccadilly, St John’s Smith Square, and the Royal Albert Hall. She made her international debut singing Messiah under Sir David Willcocks in Halle. Recent engagements have included Recent engagements include the world premiere of William Lloyd Webber St Francis of Assisi at the Chelsea Festival, concerts in France with Le Parlement de Musique, Fauré Requiem with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Nielsen Symphony No. 3 with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra under Thomas Dausgaard, and her debut with Bach Collegium Japan under Masaaki Suzuki in Messiah in Tokyo. She has also taken part in the world premiere of three new song cycles commissioned for her by John McCabe, Cecilia Macdowell and David Matthews at the Presteigne Festival and Pergolesi Stabat Mater with The Hanover Band.
Rachel Nicholls has sung recitals in the Linbury Studio Theatre of the Royal Opera House and on BBC Radio 3. Her recording as Metella in Silla with James Bowman from the 2000 London Handel Festival is available on the Somm label. She recently recorded songs by Cecilia McDowall for Dutton Epoch and Hummel’s Mass in D Minor for Sir Richard Hickox and Collegium Musicum 90.
Future engagements include Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte for Longborough Opera, recitals at the Wigmore Hall and for BBC Radio 3 and recordings of Bach Mass in B Minor () for Masaaki Suzuki (Bach Collegium Japan) and a new song cycle commissioned for her by David Matthews. |
