Rachel Nicholls (soprano)
J S Bach B Minor Mass
Wells Cathedral
Saturday, 10th November 2007
RACHEL NICHOLLS was born in Bedford, and read French and Linguistic Science at the University of
York, furthering her studies at the Royal College of Music where 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. Winner of the Second Prize at
the Kathleen Ferrier Memorial Competition, she made her début at London’s Royal Opera as Flowermaiden
Parsifal, returning as Pepik The Cunning Little Vixen, Echo Ariadne auf Naxos and Prilepa The
Queen of Spades and her other operatic engagements have included Philippa in John Browne’s Babette’s Feast
at the Linbury Studio Theatre, Frasquita Carmen and Flora The Knot Garden for Scottish Opera, the title role in
Erismena, Ginevra Ariodante and Elisa Tolomeo for English Touring Opera, Theophano Ottone
and Metella Silla at the London Handel Festival, Handel’s Susanna for The Early Opera Company, Bella
Who Put Bella in the Wych Elm for Almeida Opera, Donna Elvira Don Giovanni for Mid Wales Opera, Junon Platée
for T.C.C. Productions, Lisbon, Tatyana Eugene Onegin for Scottish Opera Go Round and Scottish Opera on Tour and Jessie Mahagonny Songspiel
at the Cantiere Internazionale d’Arte, Montepulciano.
Rachel Nicholls made her international concert début singing Messiah
under the direction of Sir David Willcocks in Halle, a work she
has also sung for Bach Collegium Japan. Other concert appearances
include performances with the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields, the
City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Darmstadt Hofkapelle, the
Hanover Band, the London Handel Players, the London Mozart Players, the
OSJ, Le Parlement de Musique and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra,
as well as at the Brighton, Chelsea, Fishguard, London Handel,
Presteigne and Three Choirs Festivals. Conductors with whom she has
worked in opera and concert include Thomas Dausgaard, Sir Colin Davis,
Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Valery Gergiev, Richard Hickox, Sir Simon
Rattle and Masaaki Suzuki. Her broadcasts include Sally Flashmob - The
Opera, Schoenberg Quartet No. 2 with the Quatuor Parisii and In Tune
for the BBC, and her recordings include B Minor Mass (BIS),
Metella Silla (Somm). Hummel Mass in D Minor (Chandos), Music
by Cecilia McDowall (Dutton) and Paul Spicer’s Easter Oratorio
(Birmingham Bach Choir).
Her current engagements include Mrs Martin La Cantatrice Chauve at the
Tête-à-Tête Opera Festival, Hansel Elephant and Castle
for Aldeburgh Festival Opera, Fiordiligi Così fan tutte
for Longborough Festival Opera, the B Minor Mass with Bach Collegium Japan, Dvorak Stabat Mater with
the BBC Concert Orchestra, Carmina Burana in Naples, Erwartung
with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Il tramonto and Schönberg String
Quartet No. 2 with the Quatuor Parisii, Gordon Riley’s GBH
with the Scottish Philharmonic Orchestra, Rossini Petite Messe Solennelle in Rome, Verdi Requiem in
King’s College, Cambridge, and Shepherd Tannhäuser at the St Endellion Festival.