Billy Joel

Billy Joel, born William Martin Joel on May 9, 1949, in the Bronx, New York, is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist who built one of the most commercially successful careers in popular music history. He grew up in the Levittown portion of Hicksville on Long Island, where he began taking piano lessons at age four at his mother's insistence. His teachers included pianist Morton Estrin and musician Timothy Ford, and he continued formal study until around age 16. As a teenager, Joel also competed in amateur boxing on the Golden Gloves circuit as a welterweight, winning 22 of his 26 fights before abandoning the sport after breaking his nose. He attended Hicksville High School but did not graduate with his class in 1967, having missed a crucial English exam after playing a late-night gig. He later submitted essays to the school board in 1992, and was awarded his diploma at Hicksville High's annual graduation ceremony 25 years after leaving.

Joel's father, Howard Joel, was born Helmut Joel in Nuremberg, Germany, to a Jewish family, and was an accomplished amateur classical pianist. His mother, Rosalind, was born in Brooklyn to Jewish parents whose family had emigrated from England. Joel's parents met in 1942 during a production of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance at the City College of New York and divorced in 1957, after which Howard returned to Europe. Joel has a half-brother, Alexander Joel, born in England, who became a classical conductor and served as chief musical director of the Staatstheater Braunschweig from 2001 to 2014.

After dropping out of high school to pursue music, Joel played in two short-lived bands, the Hassles and Attila, before signing with Family Productions and releasing his debut solo album, Cold Spring Harbor, in 1971. A live radio performance of "Captain Jack" gained popularity in Philadelphia in 1972, drawing the attention of Columbia Records, with whom he signed and released Piano Man in 1973. The title track became his signature song and earned him the nickname "the Piano Man." He followed that record with Streetlife Serenade in 1974 and Turnstiles in 1976 before achieving his critical and commercial breakthrough with The Stranger in 1977. That album became Columbia's best-selling release at the time, moving over 10 million copies and producing hit singles including "Just the Way You Are," "Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)," "Only the Good Die Young," and "She's Always a Woman."

52nd Street, released in 1978, became his first album to reach number one on the Billboard 200 and won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year. Glass Houses followed in 1980 and featured "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me," which became Joel's first single to top the Billboard Hot 100. The Nylon Curtain arrived in 1982, followed by An Innocent Man in 1983, an homage to the rhythm and blues and doo-wop music of his childhood that produced "Tell Her About It," "Uptown Girl," and "The Longest Time." His 1985 compilation Greatest Hits – Volume I & Volume II became one of the best-selling albums in the United States. River of Dreams in 1993 marked the end of his primary run of studio releases. In 2001, he released Fantasies & Delusions, an album of classical compositions written by Joel and performed by British-Korean pianist Richard Hyung-ki Joo. Joel returned to recording new material with the 2024 single "Turn the Lights Back On."

Across his recording career, Joel released 12 studio albums of pop and rock between 1971 and 1993 and has sold over 160 million records worldwide, making him the fourth-best-selling solo artist in the United States. He accumulated 33 Top 40 hits in the country, three of which — "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me," "Tell Her About It," and "We Didn't Start the Fire" — reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100. He received 23 Grammy nominations and won six. In 1987, he became one of the first artists to conduct a rock tour in the Soviet Union. Beyond recording and touring, Joel provided voiceover work for the 1988 Disney animated film Oliver & Company, performing the song "Why Should I Worry?", and contributed music to film soundtracks including Easy Money (1983), Ruthless People (1986), A League of Their Own (1992), and Honeymoon in Vegas (1992).

Joel's contributions to Broadway came through Movin' Out, for which he served as composer. The production earned him the Tony Award for Best Orchestrations in 2003. His industry recognition extends well beyond Broadway: he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1992 and received that organization's Johnny Mercer Award in 2001. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999, the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2006, and was honored at the Kennedy Center Honors in 2013.