Nicholas Varley grew up in England and studied cello, composition and music theory in Manchester. After a brief period in France he moved to South Africa where he worked as a sound engineer at Sony Records’ Downtown Studios. Nicholas went back to France in 1986 where he started to work as a sound engineer at Studio La Marque Rose in Paris and would later become the main composer at KBP (Paris). After 10 years in this position, he started working as an independent composer. It wouldn’t be too far-flung to call Nicholas Varley a multitalent, considering that he has proved himself an outstanding producer, composer, musician, arranger, and sound engineer.
Nicholas’ versatility is perfectly reflected on his wide variety of compositions. He has composed the soundtracks to Disney’s “Trail of the Panda” and Albert Pereira-Lazaro and Emmanuel Klotz’s “Lascars” (Round Da Way), as well as for online and offline campaigns for brands like L’Oréal, Armani, Armani Diamonds, Cartier, and Arthur en Vrai. He has also worked as music producer for Absolut, Klio Rosco, Lisa Caruso, Tony Parker, Inside Jack, and Anka Badiu.
Currently, Nicholas is working on an animated series for Millimages and Greenlight Media.
His studio in France is set up for 5.1 surround productions and is based around Adam monitors and SPL’s Surround Monitor Controller SMC 2489: “I replaced my Mackie Big Knob with the SMC when I upgraded to 5.1. The SMC is very precise and incredibly noiseless. I use it together with an Apogee Ensemble and an Apogee Duet. I like specially the MONO and DIM functions – they come in really handy! I use the SMC every single day and I am very satisfied with it.”
Picture by Pierre Faure
