Nick Wood is a British film composer, record producer and Creative Director of Syn. Nick has composed and arranged music for over 2,000 commercials, as well as a host of critically acclaimed film and television projects including Emmy award-winning CNN’s “Why We Go” as well as 14 coveted PromaxBDAs and 2 Clio awards.
Born in Liverpool, England, Nick launched his musical career in London at age 19 and signed with Virgin Music as the founding member of the pop group, Appassionata. In 1984, Nick was introduced to Simon Le Bon by his then roommate Yasmin, launching a decades long friendship for the trio. Shortly thereafter, Simon asked Nick to produce his song “Grey Lady of the Sea” which was inspired by his around the world Whitbread yacht race. This was Simon’s first solo song outside of Duran Duran and the beginning of a creative partnership with Nick. In 1987, Nick had the chance to travel to Japan where he wrote songs for Japanese artists Akina Nakamori and Kikkawa Koji and the following year Simon, Yasmin, and Nick designed their plan to establish a music agency in Tokyo that would focus on creative collaborations across advertising, film, television, and live experience. Syn (from Simon, Yasmin, Nick) was established in 1991 led by Nick as CEO and Creative Director.
Nick’s innovative style of composition and distinctive approach to music production has led to creative collaborations with such artists as Dr. John, Julian Lennon, Robert Palmer, Chris Corner, Graham Massey, Jon Hassell, Bebel Gilberto, Maxi Priest, Simon Le Bon, Tetsuya Komuro, Van Dyke Parks, Ariana Grande and Katy Perry. Nick’s love of film and music has allowed him the chance to work with Oscar-nominated German film director Wim Wenders, “Dream Island”, the animated film “To-i Umi Kara Kita Coo”, “13 Kaidan” (Masahiko Nagasawa’s award-winning thriller starring Tsutomu Yamazaki), “RAILWAYS 2” (starring Tomokazu Miura), Love Kills (by renowned director Mario van Peebles) “The Brighton Miracle” directed by Max Mannix, starring Temuera Morrison) and most recently, Stephen Shaw’s documentary film “Birthgap”. Nick’s songs have been licensed for HBO’s “Sex and the City” series, Michael Mann’s “Tokyo Vice” on HBO, Netflix “Fistful of Vengeance” and Apple TV’s “Pachinko” among others. Nick’s song “Passion”, was licensed by Kirin’s “Love Sports” campaign for over 20 years and went to #1 on the Oricon International Singles Chart during the 2002 FIFA World Cup held in Japan, subsequently spending 7 weeks at the #1 spot on the iTunes World Music chart.
Nick has been a guest speaker at Cannes Lions, where Nick and Simon Le Bon teamed up with Edith Bowman (from Virgin Radio UK) for the one-time event titled: "Beyond an Ordinary World – How Collaboration Inspires Ordinary to Extraordinary”. Nick’s passion for global collaborations has led him to establish Syn studios in Los Angeles, Beijing, Shanghai, Manila and London.
