J. Smith-Cameron and Joe Morton will provide narration for the MasterVoices concert performance of Ricky Ian Gordon and Michael Korie's The Grapes of Wrath at Carnegie Hall. The 120-member community chorus, led by Tony winner Ted Sperling, will conclude its 2023-2024 season with the April 17 concert, also featuring the Orchestra of St. Luke's.

The operatic adaptation of John Steinbeck's Dust Bowl-set novel will star Kyle Oliver as Tom Joad, with Margaret Lattimore and Nathan Gunn as Ma and Pa Joad. This marks a full-circle moment for Gunn, who played Tom when MasterVoices performed the opera in 2010.

Oliver, Lattimore, and Gunn will be joined by Bryonha Marie as Mae, Mikaela Bennett as Rose of Sharon, Victor Starsky as Jim Casy, Malcolm MacKenzie as Uncle John, Schyler Vargas as Connie Rivers, Christian Pursell as Noah, and John Brancy as Al.

Sperling will conduct and direct the concert performance, which will feature sound design by Scott Lehrer, costume design by Tracy Christensen, lighting design by Brian Tovar, and projections by Wendall K. Harrington.

The Grapes of Wrath is the first of three contemporary operas which MasterVoices intends to produce over the next six years as part of its newly announced Three in Six program. Said Sperling in a statement: “The major opera companies have so few slots available, and while there are innovative groups doing wonderful chamber stagings, there is little in between. So many worthy works—by some of our country’s greatest contemporary composers—have yet to be produced in New York for precisely this reason, and we look forward to opening up those vistas.”

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