Evan Bravos

About Me

Currently serving as Artist Faculty at Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts (CCPA), Dr. Evan Bravos has previously taught on the voice faculty at the University of Chicago and Carthage College. In June 2023, he was one of twelve participants for the NATS (National Association for Teachers of Singing) Intern Program, a highly competitive intensive for early career voice teachers. Having recently earned the Doctor of Musical Arts at Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music, Bravos and his three siblings launched The BravoStudio in 2020 and have enjoyed building and fostering a community of young musicians and families across Chicago. Last season, as Associate Program Director of Opera at CCPA, he coordinated Copland: The Tender Land, OperaFest and Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro. Bravos has performed regularly as a soloist with Chicago Opera Theater, has sung as a chorister at Lyric Opera of Chicago and has been a regular member of the Chicago Symphony Chorus for over a decade. 

Marked as a “talent to watch” by the Chicago Tribune, baritone Evan Bravos has received critical acclaim for his “lovely lyric baritone” (Opera News). Still very actively performing, The 2025-26 season kicked off with a return to Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago for their 15th Collaborative Works Festival in Ganz Hall alongside Grammy Award winning tenor, Nicholas Phan, soprano Vanessa Bacerra, tenor Eric Ferring, mezzo-soprano, Sophia Maekawa (current Ryan Opera Center at Lyric Opera of Chicago), pianist Lisa Kaplan and percussionist Matthew Duvall ( both of Eighth Blackbird). He performed works by Copland, Gurney and Geter. In October, he reprised the role of Hannah Before in Kaminsky, Reed and Campbell: As One with Union Avenue Opera. Shortly thereafter, he made his debut with Haymarket Opera as Caronte/Shepherd IV/Radamanto in Peri: Euridice. In November, he joined the Downers Grove Choral Society for Mozart Requiem and Vesperae solennes de Confessore and in December, Handel: Messiah with Toledo Symphony.

In the winter months, Bravos joins fellow Chicago College of Performing Arts Voice Faculty colleagues, Karim Sulayman (Grammy Award winner), and Associate Dean, pianist Shannon McGinnis, in a concert of Schubert: Der Winterreise. In March, he returns to Chicago Opera Theater, as Dritter Bursche/Ensemble in Kurt Weill: Der Silbersee. Shortly thereafter, he joins the Apollo Chorus as Jesus for respective performances of Bach: St. Matthew Passion, and later with St. James Cathedral for Sowerby: Forsaken of Man, marking the Cathedral’s sesquicentennial celebration of its rebuilding after the great fire. 

In May, he rounds out the season on the operatic stage with a return to Opera Santa Barabra to perform the title role in Robert Aldridge and Herschel Garfein: Elmer Gantry. Additionally in recital, Bravos offers a curated program, Beyond Byzantium: It’s All Greek to Me!, at the National Hellenic Museum for its inaugural concert series. The museum, a pillar of Chicago’s historic Greektown, promotes the rich cultural traditions of the Greek-American immigrant experience. The recital brings to light classical Greek art song, and operetta of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Bravos also returns to Glessner House for a recital featuring the music of La Belle Epoque with Andrea Baker, soprano and Nicholas Pothier, piano. In June, he appears again with Haymarket Opera in concert Charpentier: David et Jonathas. 

The 2024-25 season featured a concert of classic Americana with Opera Edwardsville; in September, a song cycle premiere of The Pure and the Impure by composer Elizabeth Doyle and librettist Don Gecewicz and in December, . In the spring, Bravos returns to Helena Symphony for Vaughan Williams: Symphony No. 1, A Sea Symphony and has three engagements singing the Brahms: Ein Deutsches Requiem with the Apollo Chorus of Chicago, the Grace Chorale of Brooklyn, NY and with the Evanston Symphony. 

In the 2023-24 season he revisited the role of Count in Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro as a guest artist at University of South Carolina (Columbia); sang Countess’ Lackey/Ivan Ivanovich in Shostakovich’s The Nose with Chicago Opera Theater, and made an orchestral debut with Helena Symphony on Rachmaninoff: The Bells and a featured performance of Schubert: Der Winterreise for Opera Up Close, a concert series in Chicago. Bravos’ 2022-23 season featured company debuts with White Snake Projects in Boston Let’s Celebrate! Living Holiday Traditions in America, Opera Tampa (Silvio, I Pagliacci) and a return to Chicago Opera Theater for a premiere of Shawn Okpebholo: The Cook-Off as TV host, Kenny Kincaid.  On the concert stage, he received praise for an “elegantly sung” Carmina Burana with the Hawaii Symphony Orchestra. 

In the 2021-22 season, Bravos performed the role of Hannah Before in Laura Kaminsky, Kimberly Reed and Mark Cambell’s groundbreaking As One with Opera Santa Barbara and Hawaii Performing Arts Festival. With Chicago Opera Theatre, he played El Dancaïro in Carmen alongside Jamie Barton and Stephanie Blythe, and “sang winningly” (Opera News) as Clay in the world premiere of Matthew Recio and Royce Vavrek’s opera The Puppy Episode. Other recent roles include Riff in West Side Story (New Philharmonic Opera); Maximilian in Candide (Ravinia Festival); (Hawaii Performing Arts Festival); Inman in Jennifer Higdon's Cold Mountain (Music Academy of the West); and Tom Joad in the Chicago premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon’s The Grapes of Wrath.

Other credits include San Diego Opera, Sarasota Opera, Central City Opera, Aspen Music Festival, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, and Lyric Opera of Chicago. In concert, he has sung with the symphonies of Santa Fe, Milwaukee, Madison, and Colorado and as a Fellow at the Ravinia Festival Steans Music Institute. He has been featured soloist n art song initiatives such the Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago and the Horto Music Festival in Pelion, Greece. 

D.M.A., M.M., Northwestern University Bienen School of Music; B.M. Lawrence University Conservatory of Music