Scott Hamilton & Friends Perform at Bridgestone Arena

Skaters performing at Bridgestone Arena as part of Scott Hamilton’s fundraiser performance, Rachel Suggs

Several world-class figure skaters took to the ice on Nov. 23 at Bridgestone Arena for the ninth annual Scott Hamilton and Friends show.

The show is a fundraiser for the Scott Hamilton CARES Foundation, which funds advanced cancer research.

“It brings me so much hope that we’re going to get closer and closer and closer to a day that’s going to happen in my lifetime—and I’m old—where no one dies of cancer,” Hamilton said.

Hamilton, who won the gold medal in men’s figure skating at the 1984 Winter Olympics, is a cancer survivor himself, surviving testicular cancer and three brain tumors.

After the opening number, where the show’s cast members skated as a group, Tennessee Titans announcer Matt Rogers walked onto the stage to introduce the show and Hamilton.

“This is where live music meets world-class figure skating,” Rogers said.

The stage, featured at the ice surface’s downstage, was where various classic rock acts accompanied the skaters.

The frontmen for bands such as Journey, Kansas, Chicago, REO Speedwagon and The Romantics played some of their hit songs as a mix of former competitive skaters, Olympic contenders and up-and-coming skaters took to the ice.

The show’s first skater was 2014 Olympian Polina Edmunds, who performed to a slow ballad sung by former Kansas lead vocalist John Elefante that was mashed up with Foreigner’s “Cold as Ice.”

This performance contrasted that of the next performer, Maxim Naumov, who skated a high-energy program to Loverboy’s “Turn Me Loose.” Naumov is a three-time U.S. national pewter, or fourth-place medalist and is a contender for the U.S. Olympic team for the Milano Cortina Games in February.

The first half of the show continued with performances from former competitive skaters such as British sibling ice dance team Sinead and John Kerr, U.S. Olympian and national champion Mariah Bell and Canadian skater Nam Nguyen.

Halfway through the show, the center jumbotron played a video with multiple castmates telling the audience who they are skating for—loved ones who survived, are battling or died from cancer.

Hamilton then took to the ice to introduce the rest of the audience to two women sitting in the front row. One of them recently finished her cancer treatments, while the other was recently diagnosed.

“This is our why,” Hamilton said. “This is everybody’s why.”

The next performance featured the show’s Skate Champions, who were the top fundraising recipients to be able to skate at the show.

Following their group performance to The Romantics’ “What I Like About You,” Hamilton introduced two-time Olympic pair champion Ekaterina Gordeeva, who skated to “Faithfully” by Journey.

Following Gordeeva’s performance was a group number featuring another Olympic champion, Nathan Chen. Chen, who won gold at the 2022 Olympics, did not skate a solo number, but he was the star of this group performance, which featured one section where he was lifted by three of his castmates.

The show commenced with performances from two-time U.S. national champion and 2014 Olympian Gracie Gold, Canadian skater Elladj Baldé, U.S. junior national pairs champions Olivia Flores and Luke Wang and Canadian Olympian Keegan Messing, who returned to competition in August after a two-year hiatus.

The show concluded with a final group number with the entire cast.

This article was written by Rachel Suggs