Nick’s varied career began with music, first song festivals in his hometown Rochdale, Lancashire and then with the band Sleeper’s Den formed at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. He then joined the Colorado-based Albany Bridge Band as lead singer and rhythm guitarist shortly after University while visiting the USA. The death of his father, when Nick was 21 years-old, made him rethink his future. In the mid-1980s, now back in England, he pursued a career in journalism because he ‘wanted to have an impact, right wrongs, be serious’, eventually securing a position as an award-winning environment and technology correspondent for The Times from 1989 to 2000.
Nick was then lured to the UN Environment Programme headquartered in Nairobi, by its then Executive Director, the former German environment minister Klaus Toepfer who needed a British-speaking press person after which he rose to the role of Director of Communications and Spokesperson spearheading innumerable campaigns on climate change to the loss of species to the green economy.
“Oh my love, can you hear the church bells chime. As we go around the carousel, for one last time.”
Nick’s varied career began with music, first song festivals in his hometown Rochdale, Lancashire and then with the band Sleeper’s Den formed at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. He then joined the Colorado-based Albany Bridge Band as lead singer and rhythm guitarist shortly after University while visiting the USA. The death of his father, when Nick was 21 years-old, made him rethink his future. In the mid-1980s, now back in England, he pursued a career in journalism because he ‘wanted to have an impact, right wrongs, be serious’, eventually securing a position as an award-winning environment and technology correspondent for The Times from 1989 to 2000.
Nick was then lured to the UN Environment Programme headquartered in Nairobi, by its then Executive Director, the former German environment minister Klaus Toepfer who needed a British-speaking press person after which he rose to the role of Director of Communications and Spokesperson spearheading innumerable campaigns on climate change to the loss of species to the green economy.
“Oh my love, can you hear the church bells chime. As we go around the carousel, for one last time.”
‘Scientific reports can change the mind, but the arts can change the heart and the mind’.
Sparking climate action with music and the arts
A chance meeting
Nick & Bernadette
A chance meeting however in 2014 with Bernadette La Hengst via a new initiative by Theatre Bonn—the Save the World festival—fully re-ignited his own, personal, passion and to realize in part his teenage dreams.
First, this stretched to providing backing vocals as one of La Hengst’s fluid group of vocalists and guest musicians—known as the Ladette’s– on Bernadette’s concert tours.
Initially Nick laughed at the idea of writing new songs for his own album, considering that most people would see the views of someone in their 60s, expressed through what many might deem a youth medium, amusing and have everyone rolling in the aisles.
But he changed his mind, decided that the way the older Nick saw the world through his own lens of new songs and tall tales, might provide a fresh perspective on common themes and emerging issues.
‘Perhaps the ideas, sentiments, emotions and themes will resonate across generations’.
Making music, fighting climate change
‘Scientific reports can change the mind, but the arts can change the heart and the mind’.
Sparking climate action with music and the arts
In 2014, he was asked to join the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Bonn, Germany as its Communications Director in order to help Christiana Figueres and her team secure the landmark Paris Climate Agreement of 2015 for which he was the spokesperson. Throughout his career at the UN, Nick was always keen to bring the arts including music closer to the climate and environmental agenda by working with artists and promoting their ideas on climate change to sustainable development.
A chance meeting
Nick & Bernadette
A chance meeting however in 2014 with Bernadette La Hengst via a new initiative by Theatre Bonn—the Save the World festival—fully re-ignited his own, personal, passion and to realize in part his teenage dreams.
First, this stretched to providing backing vocals as one of La Hengst’s fluid group of vocalists and guest musicians—known as the Ladette’s– on Bernadette’s concert tours.
Initially Nick laughed at the idea of writing new songs for his own album, considering that most people would see the views of someone in their 60s, expressed through what many might deem a youth medium, amusing and have everyone rolling in the aisles.
But he changed his mind, decided that the way the older Nick saw the world through his own lens of new songs and tall tales, might provide a fresh perspective on common themes and emerging issues.
‘Perhaps the ideas, sentiments, emotions and themes will resonate across generations’.