Nigel Boddice MBE, Hon. A.R.A.M., enjoys a busy, impressive, and enterprising  conducting career.

For his musical input and work with the youth of Scotland generally and West Lothian in particular, Nigel has been awarded the MBE in the 2005 Queen’s Birthday Honours.

For much of the last ten years has enjoyed travelling throughout Europe to conduct  bands  of all combinations. Highlights include the appointment as Chief Conductor to the Royal Norwegian Navy Band where for seven years he helped to develop a far reaching reputation for the ensemble whilst discovering new music, working alongside international soloists and cutting six excellent cd’s which have all received fine reviews.

Back home in Scotland Nigel  has enjoyed the standards set at  the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama with both wind and brass orchestras, the National Youth Wind Ensemble of Scotland for some six years, and  the two much heralded cd’s Celebrations and The Gathering cut by the  West Lothian Celebrity Winds, featuring many fine contemporary works from in particular Scottish composers. In recognition of this noted development work the R.S.A.M.D. invited Nigel to join the conducting faculty where he presently enjoys and performs a valued role with all ensembles as required.

As an educationalist within music, which stems from his  21 year association with the West Lothian  music service there are frequent invitations and visits to summer schools and courses worldwide which  have ranged from all the four corners of Scotland to regular forays into Europe and  U.S.A. most recently to the West of Scotland Schools Concert Band., Scottish Chamber Orchestra 's Winf Farm, the National Youth Wind Orchestra of Wales, and the German Hochsaurlandkreis Festival.

The Boddice family are steeped in the brass band world and he was taught in the local band at Church Gresley before developing at  the NYBBGB and then on to the Royal Academy of Music as a trumpeter.   It was also the brass band movement that gave Nigel his first chances to conduct  and provide the backdrop for his current work which has culminated in 2007 by winning the Scottish Brass Band Championships which gave Nigel a unique double success , both Youth and Senior titles held simultaneously thanks to West Lothian and Kirkintillioch band. Over the years he has worked with most of the top Scottish bands and has guest directed at YBS, Manger , Silkeborg and more recently in Molde on the beautiful  fjord coast of Norway and where in 2007, the new CD called 'Cheese' sold out within 3 weeks.

This has since developed into invitations to adjudicate at European, National,  Norwegian, Danish, Scottish, Northern and Yorkshire championship competitions whilst for individual levels he was appointed as external examiner at the University of Salford and at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester.

For his special association with the young musicians of West Lothian he accepted the inaugural presentation of the Mortimer Medal from the Worshipful Company of Musicians in London and for his prolific presentation of contemporary music he was honoured by the Scottish Composers Society.

Nigel Boddice’s career has been built on the solid foundation of a twenty year appointment [ 1975-95 ] as principal trumpet with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra  and subsequent conducting engagements with  the BBCSSO, the Ulster Orchestra and the Armenian Chamber Orchestra ’ Serenade’  in Yerevan  as well as a host of freelance orchestras giving him a strong repertoire base in several mediums.