Sutton Foster • Kelli O’hara • July 26, 2025 • Snow Park Outdoor Amphitheater
Reviewed and Photographed by Kevin Rolfe
The Utah Symphony has been busy this summer. The Deer Valley Music Festival has been filled with a variety of great performances. From artists like Lindsey Stirling, to the music of Disney, to The Beach Boys, the symphony shows their range and brings great performance after great performance to the Snow Park Outdoor Amphitheater at Deer Valley. July 26 was no exception. Two great Tony-Award Award-winning Broadway Stars, Sutton Foster and Kelli O’Hara, graced the Park City stage. It was a special night for fans of musical theater. Getting to see two of the best performers Broadway has to offer in our state for one night doesn’t happen here all the time. The show was well attended, and the audience was totally entranced by these vocalists.
I love every opportunity to catch a show at the Snow Park Outdoor Amphitheater at Deer Valley. When the summer heat gets the best of me I love driving up from Salt Lake City to Park City. The temperatures are much cooler and the evenings on the slopes watching amazing musicians might even require a jacket or blanket. I love it.
My time admiring these two vocalists goes back a ways. I’ve had the chance to see both of them early in their careers. I saw Sutton Foster in the role of Eponine in the national tour of “Les Misérables.” I vividly remember her powerful performance. Her name stood out, and it was exciting to see her name as a Tony nominee just a couple of years later for “Thoroughly Modern Millie.”
I saw Kelli O’Hara in the production, “Dracula, the Musical” as Lucy Westenra. If I’m being honest, I don’t remember much about her performance other than enjoying her voice. I didn’t particularly love the musical, so I tried to block a lot of it from my memory. But I was excited to see her name as a Tony nominee the following year for “The Light in the Piazza.”
Since then, both of these women have gone on to star as the lead in production after production. Both have made appearances several times here in Utah. Having them together was a real treat. They modeled this concert after the legendary Carnegie Hall concert with Julie Andrews and Carol Burnett. With Foster taking a Burnett-like role, and soprano O’Hara taking the Andrews slot. The famed concert was televised on CBS in 1962.
The show opened with the Utah Symphony performing a couple of pieces on its own. They were then joined on stage by Sutton and Kelli. They performed a medley of Broadway hits. As much as I enjoyed when they sang, I loved their stage banter. There was a segment where they wore aprons from Macaroni Grill, a place they both worked in their hometowns. I thought they were really funny and had the entire audience laughing. It was a humorous way to show their origin stories. It’s hard to believe where people come from and where they’re able to get to.
Each star took turns performing songs from musicals they performed in. Sutton Foster performed “Anything Goes” from you guessed it, the musical “Anything Goes.” Kelli O’Hara performed “Fable” from “The Light At The Piazza.”
Foster was joined on stage by three local college students, Olivia Hellin and Jordan Cruz from the University of Utah, and Johnathan Tanner from Brigham Young University. What a huge opportunity for these three. They performed admirably with Foster and the choreographer, Eric Sciotto. Cruz and Hellin later had the opportunity to perform a duet, “Let Me Be Your Star” from “Smash.” The audience loved these performers. What a great memory for them.
As much as I loved O’Hara’s performance of “Fable”, the song that stood out to me during the first half of the night was her amazing performance of “If I Loved You” from “Carousel.” It’s one of the greatest musical theater songs ever written. And it was performed perfectly by Kelli.
The second half of the concert opened with “Big D,” A song about Dallas, Texas. This song was part of the Carnegie Hall concert by Carol Burnett and Julie Andrews. It was a fun tribute to that show and the style this show was emulating. Sutton Foster performed another song from that night. A song Burnett had performed called “Meantime.” It was so wonderful to see these current stars pay homage to these great legends. They honored their legacy while giving these songs to us with their style mixed in.
The highlight of the second half had to be when Foster and O’Hara performed a medley of ’90s songs for almost ten minutes. Or what they titled,”9 Minutes of ‘90s Mega-Medley.” They referenced again the Julie Andrews and Carol Burnett concert. Mentioning that they had sung a medley of songs at their show. They joked that two Broadway singers couldn’t sing songs from their era, and then all of a sudden busted into some of the great hits of the ‘90s.
They did a great job of mixing in songs that showcased their skills with songs that were both fun and surprising to hear. Songs like “Mmmbop” by Hanson, Hold On” by Wilson Phillips, or “I’m Too Sexy” by Right Said Fred had the crowd laughing but also clapping along. Other songs like “Everything I Do I Do For You” by Bryan Adams had the audience swaying their arms from side to side. But songs such as “To Make You Feel My Love” by Bob Dylan had the audience stopped in their tracks and totally focused on the stage to hear these two women bring the show to a halt with what is one of the best songs ever written. Sung by two of the biggest stars on Broadway. It was a truly enjoyable moment in the show and had people talking about it afterward.
The night ended with a beautiful performance of “Till There Was You” from “The Music Man.” Some of the audience weren’t sure if Foster and O’Hara would be returning, so they began to pack up and leave. But when Sutton and Kelli did come back for this closing number, people stopped where they were to watch the two vocalists close out the show.
Sutton Foster and Kelli O’Hara are welcome back to Utah anytime. I have loved watching them in concert over the years. It’s a reminder that I need to make it back to New York City to see them in a production again. But I’ll take these concerts with the Utah Symphony any day. It was a beautiful night of music at Deer Valley.
