Original KISS guitarist Ace Frehley recently passed away on Thursday, October 16th at age 74 and it comes just seven weeks before the band is slated to receive a Kennedy Center Honor. That ceremony is set to tape on December 7th and to air on CBS on December 23rd.
Ace Frehley to receive honor posthumously
Frehley is set to become only the third person to receive this honor posthumously, after two other group members who likewise passed away after the group’s awards were first announced: Glenn Frey of Eagles and Phil Lesh of Grateful Dead.
Ironically, for a cultural institution named after a slain president, the Kennedy Center has a policy that its honorees must be living.
Kennedy Center Honor also issued a statement after Frehley’s passing. It read:
“The Kennedy Center is saddened to hear of the passing of one of this year’s Kennedy Center Honorees, Ace Frehley of the band KISS.
We send our deepest condolences to his friends, his family, and millions of fans worldwide.
We will be paying tribute to this “rock soldier”, his work, and his legacy at our ceremony in December.” KISS’ surviving members Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, and Peter Criss will attend. Frehley was set to join them for the first reunion appearance of KISS’ original lineup in a decade.
The Kennedy Center is saddened to hear of the passing of one of this year’s Kennedy Center Honorees, Ace Frehley of the band KISS.
We send our deepest condolences to his friends, his family, and millions of fans worldwide.
We will be paying tribute to this "rock soldier", his… pic.twitter.com/7wkAHIufDE
— The Kennedy Center (@kencen) October 16, 2025
The Eagles were originally slated to receive the honor in December 2015. However, Frey’s illness pushed the presentation back a year. Frey passed away in January 2016 at age 67 and the Kennedy Center included him when the group was honored that December.
Lesh died on October 25th, 2024 at age 84, just six weeks before the ceremony, where the group (including Lesh) was honored. The award also went to Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann and Bobby Weir, but lead guitarist and vocalist Jerry Garcia, who had died in 1995, was not honored.
In 2008, The Who were the first group to receive a Kennedy Center Honor, but only the two living members – Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey – were honored. The two members who had died – Keith Moon and John Entwistle – were not.
In 2012, Led Zeppelin became the second group to be honored, but again only the living members (John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant) were honored. There was no award for drummer John Bonham, who had died in 1980.
Even Maurice White, universally acknowledged as the mastermind behind Earth, Wind & Fire, was not included when that group was honored in 2019. The only members who were awarded were Philip Bailey, Verdine White and Ralph Johnson.
KISS is only the seventh group to receive a Kennedy Center Honor. And the award to KISS, following last year’s award to Grateful Dead, marks the first time two groups have been honored in back-to-back years. The other groups to be honored are The Who (2008), Led Zeppelin (2012), Eagles (2016), Earth, Wind & Fire (2019) and U2 (2022).
