Grammy winner J’Nai Bridges and Montreal mezzo-soprano Rihab Chaieb reflect on stepping into one of opera’s most iconic roles

One is a two-time Grammy Award winner who is making her long-awaited Canadian Opera Company (COC) debut. The other graduated from the COC’s Ensemble Studio and returns to the company after drawing acclaim around the world.

Mezzo-sopranos J’Nai Bridges and Rihab Chaieb are set to step into one of opera’s most iconic roles this fall, as they share the titular role in the COC’s production of “Carmen,” running from Oct. 14 to Nov. 4 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts.

Montreal-based Chaieb, who graduated from the COC’s incubator program for emerging artists in 2013, said it’s “surreal” returning to the company and city that helped her grow as an artist.

“It feels like coming back home,” she told the Star. “I spent three or four years here in Toronto as a young artist, spending six days a week in that building. You get attached to a lot of the people, from those in the hair and makeup and costume departments to the chorus and admin. So, it’s emotional and beautiful to connect with them again.”

Chaieb last appeared at the COC seven years ago in “Die Walküre.” She has since toured internationally, starring in productions at the Met Opera, Washington National Opera and Palm Beach Opera.

But she admits she feels the pressure of this homecoming. “I won’t lie that I’ve built a lot of pressure on myself,” she said candidly. “For me, it’s a big deal. It feels like I have to give more, and I have to prove more — coming back and showing that evolved version of myself as an artist and hoping that they like it.”

For Bridges, who won back-to-back Grammy Awards in 2021 and 2022, making her COC debut in this production is a “dream come true.”

That the American is performing at the COC is thanks in no small part to Toronto-based opera superstar Sondra Radvanovsky, whom Bridges “greatly admires” and who put the city and the COC on Bridges’ radar. (Radvanovsky herself is appearing later this season in a new production of “Macbeth.”)

“This production really is special for me because I’ve been anticipating singing at the COC for years now,” said Bridges, speaking to the Star just before a dress rehearsal.

Carmen isn’t just one of the most recognizable parts in the opera canon but also one of the most challenging. It calls for a performer of the utmost vocal and emotional prowess to navigate Carmen’s journey as a free-spirited woman caught between a young soldier and a gang of outlawed smugglers. She’s onstage for almost the entirety of Georges Bizet’s three-hour blockbuster opera, and delivers some of its most famous numbers, including “Habanera” and “Seguidilla.”

This “Carmen,” a remount of director Joel Ivany’s 2016 production, is neither Bridges’ nor Chaieb’s first time portraying the character. In fact, Carmen is one of Bridges’ signature roles, having played it at opera houses around the world, including at the Dutch National Opera and Lyric Opera of Chicago. Meanwhile, this is Chaieb’s third time playing Carmen. Following the run, she takes her Carmen to the Calgary Opera for a separate production.

“She’s a complex character, but at the same time, she’s so simple. She just wants freedom, good food, a nice man, good friends,” said Chaieb, reflecting on what she’s discovered about the character. “She has her difficulties being an unapologetic woman born in the wrong time.”

Chaieb fondly recalls, with some chuckles, her debut in the role in a radical 2019 production at the Cologne Opera, and how each Carmen since then has been such a departure from that first experience.

“I was sporting six breasts, and I was pumping breast milk out of my hands. It was … very German,” she recalled. “After doing that production, it felt like I could do any production of ‘Carmen.’”

Bridges says exploring the character is an “ever-evolving” process with each production. “I wouldn’t say the role is easy, but it’s in my body,” she said. “However, because she’s onstage singing the majority of the opera, it’s really about pacing — vocally and emotionally.”

The Washington native took an unconventional route into opera. Though her first love was piano and she sang in church choirs throughout her childhood, Bridges had her sights on a basketball career.

She loved singing and pursued it more seriously after — almost by fluke — selecting choir as her arts elective in high school. But it always came second to basketball.

By her senior year, Bridges had sports scholarships lined up. But then, one fateful basketball game changed her future in an instant.

It was a finals game, she recalled, right after choir rehearsal for Bridge’s very first opera, “Tosca.” Because of the timing, she opted to get her mother to drive her to the game directly after rehearsal, instead of joining her peers on the team bus.

Bridges, a team captain, suited up. Then her coach benched her. One period passed. Then the second. And Bridges was still on the bench.

“I was in tears,” she recalled. “My coach yelled at me in front of everyone and said, ‘You chose the singing thing over your teammates.’”

Bridges was traumatized. But “I walked out of the gym, and I decided, I’m good at basketball and I do love it, but singing, it gives me a different feeling and a different fulfilment that I want to explore.”

She pivoted to music immediately, graduating with a bachelor of music from the Manhattan School of Music, then earning her master’s from the renowned Curtis Institute of Music.

Looking back on that pivotal basketball game, Bridges has few regrets.

“There are really no mistakes in life. It’s all about your outlook,” said Bridges. “Of course, I was devastated at that point. But had that not happened, maybe I wouldn’t be where I am today.”

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