The DREAM Awards are heading back to the Orleans Showroom on October 25, bringing together a lineup of soul and R&B legends, Las Vegas entertainment veterans and a special tribute to the late producer Quincy Jones. Tickets for the ceremony start at $43.55, and the show returns after sitting out 2025 to rebuild ticket demand and reassemble its sprawling roster of honorees.
The awards show, which honors what organizers call the best of entertainment, was founded in 2017 by Chicago producer Mabel Buckner of Harrison Entertainment Group, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Buckner created the event to fulfill the vision of her late husband, Jimmy Payton, who in the 1990s became the first Black entertainment director on the Las Vegas Strip while working at the Aladdin. Buckner has said Payton wanted a great show, and that she wants to honor both her husband and deserving people in Las Vegas.
This year's honorees include comedian George Wallace, who spent a decade headlining the Flamingo Las Vegas before wrapping his Strip residency in 2014 — a run that made him one of the city's most enduring stage veterans, per the Review-Journal. Also being honored are Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Bill Medley of The Righteous Brothers, vocal group The Spinners, R&B trio Honey Cone, singer Tony Orlando, Earth, Wind & Fire's Verdine White, and Kathleen Bradley, the actress and model who in December 1990 became the first permanent African American Barker's Beauty on CBS's The Price Is Right, a role she held for a decade until 2000.
A Tribute to Quincy Jones and Clive Davis
The ceremony will also include tributes to two towering music industry figures: producer Quincy Jones, who died at age 91 in November 2024, and Clive Davis. Jones earned 28 Grammy Awards across a seven-decade career producing for artists including Frank Sinatra and Michael Jackson, according to The Guardian. His death adds emotional weight to the Orleans Showroom program, which the Review-Journal reports also plans to honor local executive Damian Costa, an R&B and jazz vocalist named Ken Young who is a retired Clark County School District Police Department division captain, and journalist Ané Marshall.
Orlando retired from touring and live concert performances in early 2024 after a 64-year music career, closing out his Las Vegas stage run with farewell shows that January. He rose to pop stardom in the 1970s with chart-toppers including “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree.” The Spinners, meanwhile, were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in November 2023, nearly five decades after topping the charts with soul hits like “I'll Be Around” and “Could It Be I'm Falling in Love.” The group originated in Detroit in 1954 and became pioneers of the orchestrated Philly soul sound, according to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
Off-Strip Roots Run Deep
Medley continues to perform locally through an ongoing residency at the off-Strip South Point Hotel & Casino alongside singing partner Bucky Heard, a presence that keeps the Righteous Brothers co-founder active in the Las Vegas showroom scene even decades after his 2003 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for hits including “You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'.” Honoree Damian Costa has similarly built his career off-Strip and on it: after serving as vice president of entertainment operations at Caesars Entertainment, he co-founded Pompey Entertainment and went on to operate venues including Jimmy Kimmel's Comedy Club at The LINQ and The Composers Room Showlounge.
The show will feature about a dozen performers, according to the Review-Journal, including Tyriq Johnson, who is associated with the Earth, Wind & Fire tribute act Serpentine Fire, along with Miss Melanie Moore, Ken Young and Lannie Counts. The ceremony will be co-hosted by Christine Shebeck and John Di Domenico. Actor Antonio Fargas, known for playing Huggy Bear on Starsky & Hutch, is also expected to take part.
Building on Last Year's Roster of Icons
The 2026 event follows a 2024 ceremony that honored an equally deep bench of R&B and soul figures, including Sherry Gordy, the daughter of Motown founder Berry Gordy; Bubba Knight, formerly of Gladys Knight and the Pips; and members of The Whispers and Little Anthony's group. That night also saw Smokey Robinson and Johnny Gill both introduce honoree Jeffrey Osborne, and recognized Evelyn Champagne King and songwriter Ray Parker Jr. Parker's résumé includes an unexpected link to this year's honorees: as a young studio musician, he played rhythm guitar on Honey Cone's 1971 chart-topping hit “Want Ads,” years before he wrote the theme song for the 1984 film Ghostbusters.
Honey Cone's “Want Ads” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in May 1971 on Holland-Dozier-Holland's Hot Wax Records, a gold-selling single from a trio formed in 1969 by lead singer Edna Wright alongside Carolyn Willis and Shelly Clark. With its blend of past chart-toppers and present-day Las Vegas entertainment figures, the DREAM Awards' return gives the 850-seat Orleans Showroom — an intimate, off-Strip venue operated by Boyd Gaming on West Tropicana Avenue — a packed night of tributes spanning generations of Black entertainment history.
