In the 2024–25 season, the two-time Grammy-winning American mezzo-soprano J’Nai Bridges makes her role debut as Maddalena in Verdi’s Rigoletto at the Metropolitan Opera. She returns to Seattle Opera in her role debut as Didon in Les Troyens and sings the title role in Carmen in her debut at the Wiener Staatsoper. Her concert engagements include Erika in Vanessa with the National Symphony Orchestra and engagements with Symphony Tacoma, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Boston Symphony Chamber Players and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. In New York City, she gives a solo recital as an artist-in-residence at the Kaufman Music Center and joins the Dessoff Choirs in Verdi’s Requiem at Trinity Church. Bridges recently made her Lincoln Center debut performing Peter Lieberson’s Neruda Songs and sang the role of Mary in John Adams’ El Niño at the Metropolitan Opera to critical acclaim.
Bridges has emerged as a leading figure in classical music’s shift toward conversations of inclusion and racial justice in the performing arts. In 2022, she was announced as one of the Kennedy Center’s NEXT50 cultural leaders and appeared with The National Philharmonic in the world premiere of Adolphus Hailstork’s A Knee on the Neck that same year. Bridges led a highly successful panel on race and inequality in opera with the Los Angeles Opera that drew international acclaim. Bridges was also featured in the Converse shoe brand’s All Stars Campaign for its “Breaking Down Barriers” collection and performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic under the baton of Gustavo Dudamel for two episodes of the digital Sound/Stage series. She was also a part of the Global Citizen movement’s Global Goal campaign, a program that also included Coldplay, Shakira, Usher and more, and she was featured as a “DVF” Woman, a campaign started by clothing designer Diane Von Furstenberg recognizing leading women who also love fashion.
Bridges is a recipient of the prestigious 2018 Sphinx Medal of Excellence Award, a 2016 Richard Tucker Career Grant, first prize winner at the 2016 Francisco Viñas International Competition, first prize winner at the 2015 Gerda Lissner Competition, a recipient of the 2013 Sullivan Foundation Award, a 2012 Marian Anderson Award winner, the recipient of the 2011 Sara Tucker Study Grant, the recipient of the 2009 Richard F. Gold Grant from The Shoshana Foundation and the winner of the 2008 Leontyne Price Foundation Competition.