Creative Team
Tim Brady - Composer and Artistic Director
Audrey Dwyer - Librettist
Cherissa Richards - Director
Music Director and Conductor - Véronique Lussier 
Set and Costume Designer - Nalo Soyini Bruce
Lighting Designer - David Perreaults Ninacs
Technical Director - Dave Surette
Sound Engineer - Morris Apelbaum
Stage Manager - Emlyn vanBruinswaardt
Assistant Director - Riel Reddick-Stevens
Sur-titles - Clémence Lavigne
Sur-titles Translation - Lisa L’Heureux
Black History Consultant - Dr. Dorothy Williams
Associate Producer/Social Media - Emily Hall
Promotion - Labonté Communications

​Cast
Alicia Ault - Time Traveller
Ruben Brutus - Charlie Christian
Clayton Kennedy - Benny Goodman/Man in Bar/Orville Gibson/Cop
Frédéricka Petit-Homme - Old Woman/Woman in Bar/Protestor/Marian Anderson
Justin Welsh - Old Man/Rufus Rockhead/Clarence Christian/Protestor

Production Photos by Pierre-Etienne Bergeron

Backstage at Carnegie Hall is an audacious, multiracial chamber opera that explores racism as seen through the eyes of legendary jazz guitarist Charlie Christian (1916-1942). The opera brings us back to December 1939, backstage at Carnegie Hall, just minutes before the revolutionary performance of Charlie with the Benny Goodman Sextet. For the first time, a Black guitarist and a white clarinettist share the stage. At that very moment, Charlie suffers an anxiety attack that starts him on a time travel journey. He confronts racism in the USA and Canada. Jumping back and forth through time, Charlie encounters historical figures such as opera singer Marian Anderson, guitar maker Orville Gibson and iconic Montreal club owner Rufus Rockhead. He sees his dead father; he gets caught in an intense 2014 demonstration against racial profiling. These interactions underscore the ongoing struggle of being a Black person – even a famous one – in a white society.