Eagles Add Vince Gill for Festival Dates

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The Eagles lineup for the Classic East and West festivals (l. to r.): Don Henley, Deacon Frey, Joe Walsh, Vince Gill, Timothy B. Schmit

Just a couple of weeks ago The Eagles announced that Deacon Frey, the 24-year-old son of the band’s late co-founder Glenn Frey, would be joining them for this summer’s Classic West and Classic East festival dates. Now, in a new announcement, it’s been revealed that country music superstar Vince Gill will also become an Eagle for the two sets of concerts, scheduled for July 15 and 16 at L.A.’s Dodger Stadium and July 29 and 30 at Citi Field in New York.

Those shows will also feature Fleetwood Mac, Steely Dan, Earth Wind & Fire, the Doobie Brothers and Journey.

Two-day and single-day tickets for Classic West are available here and here. Classic East: here and here.

In an article published yesterday in the Los Angeles Times, Gill said, “In my mind, I always thought I’d have made a good Eagle…But in a million years, I never would have seen this coming. It’s pretty surreal. I turned 60 recently, and to get to be a part of this amazing legacy of songs, that’s the greatest part of all this for me.”

Gill is one of the most successful country music artists of all time. A recording artist for more than 30 years, Gill holds the record the most Grammys received by a male country artist—21. His music has always incorporated many of the folk-rock elements that are at the root of the Eagles’ sound.

Gill and Deacon Frey will split the lead vocals on the songs that that Glenn Frey sang with the band.

In addition to the announcement of Gill’s participation, the L.A. Times article, written by Randy Lewis, noted that more tickets are being released for the shows, including single-day tickets. Those will go on sale June 5.

“People want to hear these songs played live, by the band that recorded them—and not by a tribute band,” Eagle Don Henley said in the article. “God knows, there are enough of those. And even though it’s not exactly the same band, they want to hear the songs…I think we’re doing it in a highly ethical manner that I think Glenn would approve of. That’s important to me, it’s important to Glenn’s family. If there are some detractors, then there are some detractors. I’m not going to spend a lot of time defending this, because I don’t see anything wrong with it. I think we’re carrying on a family tradition in a very family type way.”

Watch Vince Gill cover the Eagles’ “Peaceful Easy Feeling”