Nick - Cello
Originally from Farmington Hills, Michigan, Nicholas received his Bachelor’s in Music from Oakland University (Auburn Hills, MI) in May of 2025, studying under Detroit Symphony cellist Úna O’Riordan. He engages in the community as both a performer and teacher. As an orchestral musician, Nicholas has served in the Rochester, Saginaw, Flint, and Oakland symphonies, as well as in pit orchestras for productions across Metro Detroit. Recent music festival appearances have included the Sewanee Summer Music Festival (TN) and Bay View (MI) String Quartet Intensive. He is furthering his education studying cello at Bowling Green State University under the guidance of Dr. Brian Snow.
An enthusiastic teacher, Nicholas has taught privately out of his home, and held a faculty position at the Rochester Conservatory of Music, (MI) teaching one-on-one lessons and monthly studio classes. His students have ranged from early elementary school to senior citizens, with all ages in between. Nicholas has also regularly appears as a clinician at local high schools and youth orchestras, including a recent appointment as cello mentor to the Detroit Symphony Orchestra’s Civic Youth Ensembles. Over the summer of 2025, he coached middle through high-school students at Madonna University’s Chamber Music with Piano alongside violinist Velda Kelly and pianist Mary Siciliano.
Nicholas firmly believes in the importance of music in education, not just as a creative challenge, but as a powerful tool for expression. Music is unique in its ability to combine complex problem-solving, risk taking, and deep emotion into a single discipline, and he works diligently with each student on how to develop their own artistic voice at the cello. Nicholas is eager to meet each student where they are, whether that means picking up the instrument for the first time, preparing for a seating audition, or taking another stab at an instrument put down twenty years ago. In the words of Hans Christian Anderson: Where words fail, music speaks!
An enthusiastic teacher, Nicholas has taught privately out of his home, and held a faculty position at the Rochester Conservatory of Music, (MI) teaching one-on-one lessons and monthly studio classes. His students have ranged from early elementary school to senior citizens, with all ages in between. Nicholas has also regularly appears as a clinician at local high schools and youth orchestras, including a recent appointment as cello mentor to the Detroit Symphony Orchestra’s Civic Youth Ensembles. Over the summer of 2025, he coached middle through high-school students at Madonna University’s Chamber Music with Piano alongside violinist Velda Kelly and pianist Mary Siciliano.
Nicholas firmly believes in the importance of music in education, not just as a creative challenge, but as a powerful tool for expression. Music is unique in its ability to combine complex problem-solving, risk taking, and deep emotion into a single discipline, and he works diligently with each student on how to develop their own artistic voice at the cello. Nicholas is eager to meet each student where they are, whether that means picking up the instrument for the first time, preparing for a seating audition, or taking another stab at an instrument put down twenty years ago. In the words of Hans Christian Anderson: Where words fail, music speaks!
