Nicholas Tamagna was born in upstate New York and as a child traveled with his mother and aunt's band, Leather and Lace. At the University of North Carolina Greensboro he began his academic musical study with the piano. He switched his concentration to voice and transferred to the Manhattan School of Music and later earned a masters degree at Hunter College. Nicholas changed from being a baritone to a countertenor in 2007. He was the first winner of the Nico Castel International Mastersinger Competition (2011) and the Arkadi Foundation Opera Idol Competition (2011), as well as a Semi-Finalist (2011) in the first ever countertenor competition, the Gianni Bergamo Classic Music Award for Countertenors in Lugano, Switzerland. He has performed with various regional opera houses (in New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Maryland, Virginia, and Louisiana), orchestras, choirs, and ensembles across the US and internationally in (Czech Republic, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy).