Nicholas Phan is a Grammy Award-winning lyric tenor, curator and educator, celebrated for his expressive artistry and versatility across a repertoire spanning nearly 500 years. Described by The Boston Globe as “one of the world’s most remarkable singers,” he has earned international recognition for his captivating stage presence, keen intelligence and natural musicianship. In 2010, he co-founded Art Song Chicago to promote art song and vocal chamber music and serves as its artistic director.
Sought after as a curator and programmer, in addition to his work as artistic director of Art Song Chicago, Phan is the host and creator of BACH 52, a web series examining the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. He has created programs for broadcast on WFMT and WQXR and has also served as guest curator for projects with the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Bravo! Vail Music Festival, San Francisco Opera Center and San Francisco Performances, where he served as the vocal artist-in-residence from 2014 to 2018. Praised by Chicago Classical Review as “the kind of thoughtful, intelligent programming that should be a model,” Phan’s programs often examine themes of identity, highlight unfairly underrepresented voices from history and strive to underline the relevance of music from all periods to the currents of the present day.
To open the 2025–26 season, Phan curates and performs in Art Song Chicago’s 2025 Collaborative Works Festival. Now celebrating its 15th anniversary season, Art Song Chicago continues to redefine the art song recital as a dynamic and socially engaged form. This year’s festival, taking place September 4–6, 2025, is themed “Songs of War and Peace” and explores the emotional and political landscapes shaped by conflict and reconciliation through a diverse array of vocal music.
Following the Chicago song festival, Phan makes his debut at Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, performing the role of Yonas in Kaija Saariaho’s Adriana Mater in a production directed by Peter Sellars. Other highlights of the 2025–26 season include returns to the New York Philharmonic and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, a debut with ORCAM in Madrid, concerts inspired by his BACH 52 web series in New York City and Santa Fe, a Kennedy Center recital with pianist Myra Huang, and co-leading a day of concerts celebrating composer Rebecca Clarke at London’s Wigmore Hall with mezzo-soprano Kitty Whately and pianist Anna Tilbrook coinciding with the release of his new album Rebecca Clarke — The Complete Songs on Signum Records.
Phan won the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording for his recording of Kaija Saariaho’s Adriana Mater with Esa-Pekka Salonen and the San Francisco Symphony. His album, A Change is Gonna Come, was nominated for the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album. His previous albums, Stranger: Works for Tenor by Nico Muhly, Clairières and Gods and Monsters, were nominated for the same award in 2023, 2020 and 2017. He is the first singer of Asian descent to be nominated in the history of the Best Classical Solo Vocal Album category, which has been awarded by the Recording Academy since 1959.
A passionate proponent of vocal chamber music, he has collaborated with many chamber musicians, including pianists Mitsuko Uchida, Richard Goode, Jeremy Denk, Graham Johnson, Roger Vignoles, Inon Barnatan, Myra Huang, Gabriel Kahane, Craig Terry, Lisa Kaplan and Alessio Bax; violinists James Ehnes, Daniel Hope and Tai Murray; cellist Paul Watkins; the Brooklyn Rider, Jasper and Spektral string quartets; guitarist Eliot Fisk; harpists Bridget Kibbey and Sivan Magen; and horn players Jennifer Montone, Radovan Vlatković and Gail Williams. In both recital and chamber concerts, he has been presented by Carnegie Hall, London’s Wigmore Hall, San Francisco Performances, Cal Performances, the Aspen Music Festival, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Atlanta’s Spivey Hall, Boston’s Celebrity Series and the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Perpetually working to build the vocal chamber repertoire, he has had numerous new song cycles composed for him by many of today’s pre-eminent composers, including Lembit Beecher, Viet Cuong, Vivian Fung, Jake Heggie, Gabriel Kahane, Aaron Jay Kernis, Missy Mazzoli, Joel Puckett, Errollyn Wallen and Nico Muhly.
A prolific concert artist, Phan regularly appears with many of the leading orchestras in the world, including the Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, London Symphony, Bavarian Radio Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, National Symphony, Atlanta Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, New World Symphony, Philharmonia Baroque, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Boston Baroque, Il Pomo d’oro, Bach Collegium Japan, Les Violons du Roy, Orchestre de la Suisse-Romande, BBC Symphony, English Chamber Orchestra, Strasbourg Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic, Swedish Radio Symphony, Philharmonia Orchestra of London and the Lucerne Symphony. He has toured extensively throughout the major concert halls of Europe and has appeared with the Oregon Bach, Ravinia, Marlboro, Edinburgh, Rheingau, Saint-Denis, Music @ Menlo and Tanglewood festivals, as well as the BBC Proms. Among the conductors he has worked with are Marin Alsop, Harry Bicket, Herbert Blomstedt, Pierre Boulez, Karina Canellakis, Jonathan Cohen, James Conlon, Alan Curtis, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Charles Dutoit, James Gaffigan, Grant Gershon, Alan Gilbert, Jane Glover, Giancarlo Guerrero, Matthew Halls, Manfred Honeck, Bernard Labadie, Louis Langrée, Cristian Măcelaru, Nicholas McGegan, Zubin Mehta, Tito Muñoz, Riccardo Muti, John Nelson, Andris Nelsons, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, George Petrou, Hans-Christoph Rademann, Christian Reif, Helmuth Rilling, David Robertson, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Masaaki Suzuki, Michael Tilson Thomas, Bramwell Tovey, Ruben Valenzuela, Jaap Van Zweden and Franz Welser-Möst.
Phan’s many opera credits include appearances with the Los Angeles Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Glimmerglass Festival, Chicago Opera Theater, Seattle Opera, Portland Opera, Glyndebourne Opera, Maggio Musicale in Florence, Deutsche Oper am Rhein and Frankfurt Opera. His operatic repertoire includes the title roles in Bernstein’s Candide, Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex and Handel’s Acis and Galatea; Almaviva in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Nemorino in L’elisir d’amore, Fenton in Falstaff, Tamino in Die Zauberflöte, Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni and Lurcanio in Ariodante.
As an educator, Phan served on the voice faculty of the DePaul University School of Music from 2018 to 2020 and currently serves as a coach on the faculty of the San Francisco Opera Center, where he works with the Adler Fellows. He has guest taught (working as both a voice teacher and a coach) at the Eastman School of Music, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, University of Michigan, Merola Opera Program and Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at the Metropolitan Opera. In demand as a masterclass clinician, he has taught masterclasses for the Tanglewood Music Center, University of Michigan, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Oberlin Conservatory, Boston Conservatory, University of Chicago, University of Houston, Longy School of Music, Oregon Bach Festival, American Conservatory Theater and the San Francisco Girl’s Chorus.
Raised in Ann Arbor, MI, Phan is a graduate of the University of Michigan and is the 2012 recipient of the Paul Boylan Distinguished Alumni Award and the 2018 Christopher Kendall Award. He is an alumnus of the Houston Grand Opera Studio and studied at the Manhattan School of Music, the Aspen Music Festival and School and Ravinia’s Steans Institute.