Review & setlist: Sutton Foster and her thoroughly modern cohorts warm up the Colonial

Concert Reviews

The Tony-winner took full advantage of support from Emerson Musical Theatre students and the South Shore Dance Ensemble.

By Marc Hirsh

January 25, 2026 | 5:45 PM

4 minutes to read

Sutton Foster at Emerson Colonial, Saturday, Jan. 24, 2026.

“I’m a two-time Tony winner.” Tossing that out in the middle of a concert could be a lot of things: a flex, a segue to a song from one of the shows in question, a prompt for cheap applause, an ego run rampant. In Sutton Foster’s case, it was comic self-deprecation.

The Broadway and television star (and mother of a 9-year-old) had just sung “Raining Tacos,” Parry Gripp’s maddeningly ubiquitous children’s meme, to an audience that seemed in large part to be hearing it for the first time. With lyrics of lettuce and shells, cheese and meat having just poured out of her, the singer wished to remind everyone that she was in fact quite accomplished, despite the ridiculousness she’d just engaged in arguing otherwise.

The rest of Saturday’s performance at the Emerson Colonial didn’t quite meet that level of reassurance that Foster is just like the regular folks who succumb to the same goofy earworms, but as two-time Tony winners go, she was refreshingly down to earth, -ish. She punctuated her showtunes with Simon & Garfunkel, Dan Fogelberg, the Carpenters, Mister Rogers, and Mary Tyler Moore, and her goal never seemed to be to stun with skill and power but to ease minds with comfort and warmth.

And with a little bit of cheek. Taking the stage as the temperature on the other side of the venue was dropping into single digits, Foster opened with “In The Cool, Cool, Cool Of The Evening” and tossed in lyrical references to Boston and the Colonial. For the simple and jaunty “Love Somebody,” she ended up replacing the line “I love somebody but I won’t say who” with “I love somebody and his name is…” before cutting herself off, winking at her new relationship with her The Music Man costar Hugh Jackman without coming right out and saying it.

But there was earnestness as well, even as she admitted, “Every new song I hear, I end up Broadwayizing it.” With her thin, gentle head voice, “The Nearness Of You” was softly overwhelmed. “Goodnight My Someone” — her daughter’s night-night song from even before she was in The Music Man, Foster said — was transformed from a yearning plea to an unknown lover into a cozy lullaby.

Both sides were combined in “I Know It’s Today” from Foster’s time as Princess Fiona in Shrek The Musical (“one of two swamp princesses I’ve played on Broadway”). Played for comic melodrama, it displayed a fierce optimism in defiance of the facts and became a touching anthem for holding on to hope.

Foster was ably aided on that song by two other Fionas: 10-year-old Beverly native Livia Quist and Emerson student Arianna Arocho. That began a running theme of Foster sharing the spotlight with the next generation of musical-theatre performers, the kids that she used to be when she dreamed of being on the stage. Arocho was joined by her fellow Emerson Musical Theatre students for the train-track Broadway of “On My Way” from Violet, and Foster left the stage entirely as the chorus sang “Ev’ry Time We Say Goodbye” with gorgeously intricate a cappella harmonies.

“Anything Goes” became a full-on tap number thanks to the South Shore Dance Ensemble. And a flapper-jazz mashup had Foster weaving “I Got Love” from Purlie around Boston Conservatory student Abby McDonough simultaneously singing “Gimme Gimme” from Thoroughly Modern Millie, a clever way for Foster to get out of performing the 11 o’clock number from her breakthrough show yet again.

Sharing the stage with young performers wasn’t simply a Broadway veteran paying it forward; it helped add dynamics to a show that might have conceivably been flat otherwise through no fault of Foster’s. Her only accompaniment was her longtime pianist Michael Rafter, and even playful numbers like the frisky and frayed “Undecided” might have felt hemmed in otherwise. But the glorious voices of the chorus and fellow soloists added much-needed dimension, as did Rafter himself, popping in with vocal counterpoint on “Raining Tacos” and the bouncy “A Doodlin’ Song.”

Foster ended with everyone on stage together to deliver a generous send-off of “Never Alone” before inviting the audience to sing with her as “Till There Was You” skipped along and voices filled the auditorium. By the end, it was just her.

Setlist for Sutton Foster at Emerson Colonial, Jan. 24, 2026

• In The Cool, Cool, Cool Of The Evening (Bing Crosby and Jane Wyman cover)
• The Nearness Of You (Chick Bullock cover)
• Love Somebody (Doris Day and Buddy Clark cover)
• Three Little Birds (Bob Marley and the Wailers cover)/The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy) (Simon & Garfunkel cover)
• Raining Tacos (Parry Gripp cover)
• Undecided (John Kirby and The Onyx Club Boys cover)
• Goodnight My Someone (Barbara Cook cover)
• I Know It’s Today (with Arianna Arocho and Livia Quist)
• On My Way (Lauren Ward cover) (with Arianna Arocho and Emerson College Musical Theatre BFA students)
• Ev’ry Time We Say Goodbye (Nan Wynn and Jere McMahon cover) (Emerson College Musical Theatre BFA students)
• Anything Goes (Ethel Merman cover)
• It’s A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood (Fred Rogers cover)
• Same Old Lang Syne (Dan Fogelberg cover)
• A Doodlin’ Song (Peggy Lee cover)
• Who I’d Be (Brian d’Arcy James, Sutton Foster and Daniel Breaker cover)
• Gimme Gimme/I Got Love (with Abby McDonough) (Melba Moore cover)
• Love Is All Around (Sonny Curtis cover)/Top Of The World (The Carpenters cover)
• Life Is Just A Bowl Of Cherries (Ethel Merman cover)
• Never Alone (Jim Brickman and Sara Evans cover) (with Emerson College Musical Theatre BFA students)

ENCORE:

• Till There Was You (Barbara Cook & Robert Preston cover) (with Emerson College Musical Theatre BFA students)

Marc Hirsh can be reached at [email protected] or on Bluesky @spacecitymarc.bsky.social.

Marc Hirsh is a music critic who covers a wide variety of genres, including pop, rock, hip-hop, country and jazz.