Baritone Nicholas LaGesse has been hailed by The Huffington Post as "wonderful eye and ear candy." He recently made his debut with Salt Marsh Opera and is in his fourth and final year as an Emerging Artist at Boston Lyric Opera (BLO).
His 2022–2023 BLO season began with singing Mercutio in Gounod’s Romeo and Juliet. This production—done in conjunction with Commonwealth Shakespeare Company—marked BLO’s first public opera performance at Boston Commons in 20 years. Previous appearances with BLO include performing the comprimario role, Man in Bar in Terence Blanchard’s Champion as well as covering Young Emile in Champion and Silvio in Pagliacci.
Nicholas is a frequent collaborator with Pacific Opera Project and sang in their productions of Ariadne auf Naxos as Harlekin, The Merry Widow as Danilo, and covered the title role in Don Giovanni. During his 2015 season, he debuted as Jameson in the critically acclaimed mobile opera Hopscotch by the Industry, an experimental company based in Los Angeles. He has been honored as a finalist in the Palm Springs Opera Guild Competition, the winner of the Chicago Chapter of the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) Competition, and was a Bella Voce award recipient in the Bel Canto Foundation Competition.
In addition to his musical endeavors, Nicholas is equally skilled in the world of Latin Dance and has danced with the companies Clave y Tumbao and Bachata Caliente in Los Angeles. He previously was on the dance faculty of Soho Dance Los Angeles, where he taught Bachata and studied under the tutelage of former world champion Raul Santiago.
He holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Northwestern University, a Master of Music from UCLA, and has also trained at Marlena Malas’ summer voice institute at the Chautauqua Institution.