Biography

Biography

Nick Ingman was born in London. He attended schools in the city.
After school,  Nick’s interest in pop and jazz led him to attend the only college in the world at the time which dealt with non classical music, The Berklee College of Music in Boston, USA. Nick studied Arranging and Composition there for three years, whilst also attending a sandwich course at near-by New England Conservatory of Music. Some of the guest lecturers at Berklee included Quincy Jones and Gary Burton.
Returning to the UK in 1969, Nick was lucky enough to land a job as assistant to record producer Norrie Paramor. Norrie had been one of the most successful producers with EMI Records in the 50’s and 60’s.

Nick’s long association with the BBC started at this time and he became staff arranger and conductor with the BBC Midland Orchestra and The BBC Radio Orchestra, producing up to ten titles a week for Radio Two.

By now, Nick’s reputation as an arranger for pop records was growing and he had early hits with Sade, Everything But The Girl, The Fine Young Cannibals, The Pale Fountains, and Working Week.

In 1987, his old teacher Graham Collier invited him to join him as part of the newly formed Jazz Department at the Royal Academy of Music. Within a year, Nick had created his own department, the Commercial Music Department, which he continued to run successfully for the next ten years. At the time, it was the only department of its kind in the UK, but has now many imitators. Nick was awarded a Hon RAM in 1990.

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The 1990’s proved to be Nick’s busiest time. The Britpop phenomenon demanded a steady flow of string arrangements, and Nick scored for all the major acts of the day, including Oasis, Blur, Suede, Manic Street Preachers, Ned’s Atomic Dustbin, and Menswear. Other acts that were on Nick’s credits list were the Lighthouse Family, Diana Ross, David Bowie, Gabrielle, and Sinead O’Connor.

Also during this time, Nick’s work as a film orchestrator and conductor began to increase. His association with composer Stephen Warbeck, produced a number of highly acclaimed films such as “Mrs Brown”, “Shakespeare in Love”, “Billy Elliot” and “Captain Corelli’s Mandolin”

At the end of the ’90’s, Nick’s work included a tour of the USA with Eric Clapton and a string section playing Nick’s arrangements from the album “Pilgrim”, a six week sell out series of concerts at the Albert hall with Cliff Richard and the Royal Philharmonic. In 1997, Nick arranged and conducted a concert in New York, with Portishead and the New York Philharmonic.

During this time, Nick became a frequent guest conductor with the London Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and The Philharmonia, involved in a number of cross over projects such as Russell Watson’s 5 million selling debut album.

As the new millennium started, Nick’s work on the pop side continued with hits for Eric Clapton, Dido (at last count, her last album had topped the twenty million mark) Morcheeba, Radiohead (“O.K. Computer”), Madonna, Robbie Williams and Elton John. He was also involved in the Pop Idol phenomenon, starting his association with Will Young in particular, with whom he went on to have many hits.
His work as an arranger of pop records has culminated in 13 No. 1 records and five double platinum records in the UK alone.
He has been nominated for 3 Grammy’s: for his role as conductor of a new cast album of West Side Story recorded with The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, for arranging Sade’s multi-million selling album Lover’s Rock and a similar role on Eric Clapton’s album Pilgrim
In 2010 he was inducted into The Musician’s Union Hall Of Fame.

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