“It's an Honor to Stand Next to This Man”: Kenny Chesney and Mac McAnally Deliver Heartwarming Tribute to Jimmy Buffett at Sphere Las Vegas

Kenny Chesney closed out his hugely popular 2025 Sphere Las Vegas residency with a spectacular double-header across the weekend, with the No Shoes Nation figurehead confirming he'll be returning to the immersive venue in the summer of 2026.

As the anticipation built ahead of his final stretch of shows at Sphere this year, social media was abuzz with speculation as to who Chesney might invite on-stage as a special guest.

Before this weekend, we'd had cameos from Kelsea Ballerini, Megan Moroney, Old Dominion, Grace Potter and Uncle Kracker, with attendees sure Kenny Chesney had someone else up his sleeve for the last weekend of the whirlwind 2025 residency.

And it's safe to say he delivered, with Kenny Chesney joining forces with Mac McAnally, for a spellbinding rendition of ‘Come Monday’ in tribute to their good friend, Jimmy Buffett.

Introducing his pal and collaborator, the ‘I Go Back’ hitmaker warmly gushed, “The wonderful Mac McAnally. It's been a minute since we've done this. I called Mac one day...I was going into the studio to record a song, and I called Mac and said this...”

McAnally finished the heartwarming tale, “He said, ‘Mac, can you come to the studio tomorrow’, and I said, ‘Yes sir, I can. What do you want to do?’ and he said, ‘I want to cut one of your songs, and I don't care which one’. If you're a songwriter, you've never heard anything like that in your life. I go up the next day to the studio, and Kenny comes over and he says, ‘What song do you want to sing, Mac? I know a whole bunch of your songs’. I said, ‘It doesn't matter to me, Kenny, because I know a whole bunch of my songs, too...’”, drawing laughs throughout the venue.

McAnally went on to reflect on how ‘Down the Road’, which originally appeared on his 1990 album, Simple Life, arose, “He said, ’Well, I don't have any kids of my own yet, but if and when I do I want to tell my kids what you said to your kids - who are all here tonight, by the way...And this little song here, I wrote this on a Christmas morning doing some of that Daddy stuff you do in the middle of the night on Christmas morning, and I got this really clear picture of family and how much it matters”.

Mac McAnally joined Kenny Chesney on the latter's beautifully intricate 2008 remake of ‘Down the Road’, with McAnally concluding his Sphere speech by paying homage to Chesney, “And it's an honour to stand next to this man in this round building. Let me just say, there's nobody else on the planet like that man right there”.

It might not have been one of the most headline-grabbing guest appearances of Kenny Chesney's 2025 Sphere Las Vegas residency, but in our opinion, it was the most meaningful.

The two artists have been buddies for years now, and they took the opportunity to deliver a stunning tribute to one of Chesney's biggest influences and McAnally's Coral Reefer Band frontman, Jimmy Buffett, with a touching take on ‘Come Monday’.

Following their performance, Chesney tipped his cap once again to McAnally, “For all the intensity of the production, these shows have been unbelievably fluid, capable of change-ups and crazy requests. Yes, it really is another dimension when it comes to how you experience the music, but it’s ultimately the songs that stand out”.

He went on, “Mac McAnally proved that. He is such a soul/heart singer, and all the warmth of what he does only grew greater on that stage. Whether it was mostly the two of us and our guitars or something like ‘Two Dozen Roses,’ the audience got to experience the root of what makes him so great. That voice of his, which feels like an old friend, took on an even more comfortable presence. It was amazing”.

The duo previously teamed up with James Taylor to perform the iconic Buffett track during the ‘Margaritaville’ legend's posthumous Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in October.

With Buffett's sister in attendance, Chesney and McAnally dedicated the performance to her, before looking up to Heaven and thanking the Parrothead flag-bearer for everything.

They also linked up to perform another of McAnally's stellar co-writes, Shenandoah's ‘Two Dozen Roses’, giving the Sphere finale the sense of warmth and congeniality that underpins Chesney's No Shoes Nation fanbase. Rest assured we'll be counting down the days until the island-inspired country titan returns next summer.

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