by Bob Sparrow
Last Saturday evening we had the pleasure of seeing the final performance of the Eagles at the Sphere in Las Vegas – it was way past awesome! The sound system alone is incredible, featuring 167,000 speakers! Seeing your favorite band of all time is one thing, seeing it in a $2.3 billion highest-tech venue in the world is definitely quite another. To make the experience even better, the Sphere has haptic seats, so when there was a thunderstorm surrounding you on screen, your seat would vibrate. The songs, featuring their tight harmonies, were all familiar, the surroundings, featuring beautiful land and seascapes of all types, were mind-blowing!
We were told by friends who just saw the previous night’s show that the Eagles would suggest to the audience to see ‘The Third Encore’ after the show, which is a room of Eagle memorabilia, connected to the adjoining Venetian Hotel. We were told to go before the show to avoid the crowds. We did and got to see what the Hotel California looked like and we were going to check in, but we knew we could never leave!
An added surprise at this event, was that as we were traversing the escalator to our seats, which were in the middle of the of the 18,600-seat Sphere and were all full; I no sooner got the words out of my mouth that we’d probably see someone we know, than we ran into neighbors from our ‘hood, Clint and Debbie Shafer. They live about a seven-iron from us. I had to throw the golf analogy in since it was the week of the Masters.
The April 11, 2026 show was their final performance of the Eagles’ 58-show residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas. It concludes their “Long Goodbye” tour run at the venue, which was extended to include April dates after previous “final” announcements. The band has one other show on the books at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival on May 2, maybe their last ever.
Don Henley, one of the two founders of the group in 1971, is the only remaining original band member, but all the current members are incredible. Guitar player, Deacon Frye, who has an incredible voice, is the son of the other founding member of the Eagles, Glen Frye, who passed away 2016. Rocker Joe Walsh joined the Eagles in 1975. Timothy B. Schmit replaced original bass player, Randy Meisner in 1977, and Vince Gill, who was already an established country singer and song writer, joined the band in 2017, he sings most the songs that Glen Frye sang. Gill has a great voice and is a very accomplished guitar player.
A very, very memorable experience!
To cap our musical weekend off, on Sunday night we saw the rock band, the Bronx Wanderers at the South Point Resort. I’ve written about them before here, as this was our fourth time seeing them. They are a great band that includes a father and his two sons. They do songs from the 60s, 70s and 80s and do a killer job on Bohemian Rapsody.
The rest of the week in Vegas, through Thursday, was dedicated to our Yorba Linda annual golf outing – always fun!
Caution: If you get a call or text from me this week, ignore it, it’s probably me asking for money, as I’ve never had to be in Vegas for six days straight!