Although they’re both Broadway stars who have been in the business for over two decades, and they both have the distinction of being a guest artist for the Tabernacle Choir’s Christmas concert that airs on PBS every year, Sutton Foster and Kelli O’Hara had never collaborated together professionally.
The Tony Award-winning singers are remedying that now.
“Kelli and I have known each other for many, many years and yet we’ve never worked together. So we jokingly say we had to create our own show just so we could work together,” Foster recently told Northern Virginia Magazine.
On Saturday, that show makes its way to the Utah Symphony’s Deer Valley Music Festival, a little over 30 miles from where they made their Tabernacle Choir debuts.
Here’s a brief overview of what to expect from the upcoming show with the Utah Symphony, and a look back at the Broadway stars’ appearances in the Tabernacle Choir Christmas concerts.
Sutton Foster, Kelli O’Hara unite for a show in Utah
Foster and O’Hara performed on the same bill for the first time back in 2020, just a few days before the pandemic, but that concert at Stony Brook University largely featured each of them performing their own sets.
This new show is a full-on collaboration between the two Broadway stars, inspired by the 1962 CBS special “Julie and Carol at Carnegie Hall” that highlighted the talents and banter of theater legends Julie Andrews and Carol Burnett, per the Deer Valley Music Festival website.
“It was this incredible evening celebrating two strong women. That was the jumping off point, being inspired by their show at Carnegie Hall,” Foster told Town & Country magazine in 2023. “Maybe five years ago, Kelli reached out with the idea of not exactly recreating the evening but being inspired by that duo.”
Their show honors the spirit of that 1962 special while featuring music and stories from their own Tony Award-winning and nominated shows.
The pair debuted the show at Carnegie Hall in 2023, performing from musicals that have shaped their careers — including “The Music Man,” “South Pacific” and “The Light in the Piazza” — and also a pop medley featuring hits from Nirvana, Wilson Phillips, Madonna, Cher and Mariah Carey, per Town & Country magazine.
“I think this show is truly unlike anything out there today,” O’Hara recently told Broadway World. “Fully scripted with skits, stories and new takes on songs with gorgeous orchestrations celebrating friendship.”
When did Sutton Foster and Kelli O’Hara perform with the Tabernacle Choir?
The show at Deer Valley comes about eight years after Foster performed in the Tabernacle Choir Christmas concert, and six years after O’Hara’s turn as a guest artist.
Foster, who has earned Tony Awards for roles in “Anything Goes” and “Thoroughly Modern Millie,” performed on the Conference Center stage in 2017, alongside “Downton Abbey” star Hugh Bonneville as narrator.
“As soon as I walked onstage, I just was so overwhelmed by the spirit of the season,” Foster said at a press conference at the time, per Deseret News. “It was truly, truly moving.”
Songs from Foster’s performance with the Tabernacle Choir included:
- “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year”
- “Christmas Time Is Here”
- John Denver’s “Sunshine On My Shoulders”
- “Pure Imagination” from “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory”
O’Hara’s turn came in 2019, and marked the 20th Christmas concert the Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra at Temple Square performed in the 21,000-seat Conference Center, the Deseret News reported.
“This is the ultimate invitation, isn’t it?” the Broadway star said at a press conference at the time, per Deseret News. “The chance to sing in front of a live orchestra of this caliber with the voices of 365 singers led by this man (Mack Wilberg), I think anyone would jump at the chance, and I just happened to be the lucky one this year that was asked, and I wanted to move mountains to make it work.”
O’Hara performed on the Conference Center stage alongside narrator Richard Thomas, well known for his role as John-Boy in “The Waltons.”
Songs from her performance included:
- “Mary’s Little Boy Child”
- “The Birthday of a King”
- The lullaby “A Cradle in Bethlehem,” one of her father’s favorite Christmas songs
“There is a spirit here. A lovely spirit that inspires me, that is overwhelming to me,” O’Hara said during the concert, noting that she grew up listening to the Tabernacle Choir. “I feel the spirit of home and family and Christmas here.”