Billy Joel’s Top 10 New York moments, 150 MSG shows later
When asked to pick “the definitive Billy Joel song” on the red carpet at this year’s Grammys, the man himself told E! News that it was “And So It Goes.”
“In every heart there is a room/A sanctuary safe and strong/To heal the wounds from lovers past/Until a new one comes along,” croons the Big Apple’s “Big Shot” at the beginning of the heartbreaking piano ballad that closes his 1999 album “Storm Front.”
And for 10 years of Joel’s historic monthly residency at his hometown arena, Madison Square Garden has been that room, that sanctuary, that place to heal your wounds — and maybe believe again in the promise of a new love coming along.
But after 104 sold-out shows, 1.9 million tickets scanned, and countless hearts and faiths restored by the power of his Piano Man magic, Joel, 75, will be movin’ out of the Garden on Thursday night with the final show of a decade-long lovefest that began on Jan. 27, 2014.
Fittingly, the finale (airing on SiriusXM’s The Billy Joel Channel at a later date) will be the 150th concert of the Bronx-born, Long Island-bred legend’s career at his local spot — which had become his house as much as it was for the Knicks or the Rangers.
He has been, no doubt, a one-man franchise.
But as he bittersweetly sang 25 years ago, “And so it goes, and so it goes/And so will you soon, I suppose.”
As Joel says goodbye to his MSG residency — a gig, an affair to remember — we look back on the top 10 New York moments from our hometown hero’s iconic career.
Long Island love from the New York newcomer
Having moved to the Levittown section of Hicksville, New York, when he was just 1, Joel named his debut LP, 1971’s “Cold Spring Harbor,” after one of his Long Island stomping grounds, and the album cover features a portrait of the young artist on Harbor Road in the hamlet. And “She’s Got a Way” showed just how much of a way he had with a piano ballad.
A hometown anthem for the ages
Although Joel moved to Los Angeles to record 1973’s “Piano Man” and 1974’s “Streetlife Serenade,” he said goodbye to Hollywood with 1976’s “Turnstiles,” writing “New York State of Mind” upon his return back East.
“I was on a Greyhound bus on my way back from a gig somewhere,” Joel told SiriusXM in 2016. “And I was really homesick for New York, and the words started coming to me on the bus, and the melody.”
Joel brings ‘52nd Street’ to the world
After its release in October 1978, Joel’s sixth studio album — named after the Manhattan block where his label was then headquartered and the studio where “52nd Street” was recorded — went on to become his first LP to go No. 1 on the Billboard 200. And then for good measure, it won the Album of the Year Grammy in 1980.
Billy takes MSG in headlining debut
Two months after he released “52nd Street,” Joel cemented himself as one of the Concrete Jungle’s ultimate entertainers with his headlining debut at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 14, 1978. With the singer making himself right at home at his local arena — just as “My Life” was living large on the charts — it was his first of 149 more shows to come.
Double play at Yankee Stadium
Joel was the first rock artist to play Yankee Stadium June 22 and 23, 1990. With all due respect to the late George Steinbrenner, for those two nights he was “The Boss.”
An induction into immortality
Although the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony alternates between Cleveland, Ohio — where the institution is located — and New York, Joel had the luck of being enshrined in his Big Apple backyard at the Waldorf Astoria in 1999. And who did the honors at the swanky Midtown hotel? None other than his idol Ray Charles.
New York state of mourning
Joel showed up when his city needed him the most — right after 9/11 — with “New York State of Mind.” “When we did it at that telethon immediately after 9/11, everybody was just about in tears trying to get through the song,” he told Newsday in 2015. “I just kept staring at the fireman’s helmet on the piano, and I just kept thinking, ‘Just look at the helmet, just look at the helmet … Think about the guy who wore that helmet and do the song.’ ”
The last rock star at Shea
After rocking Yankee Stadium in 1990, Joel would go on to show bipartisan support for the New York Mets too, battering up for the Last Play at Shea concerts on July 16 and 18, 2008, before the Queens baseball stadium was demolished.
MSG becomes Billy’s house
Joel took the piano bench for the first night of his historic monthly residency at Madison Square Garden on Jan. 27, 2014 — which, after a pandemic pause in 2020, resumed in November 2021.
“We’re back in the Garden. I want to thank you for waiting,” Joel told the crowd. “Sorry that we shut everything down, but we’re back.”
Strong Island faithful!
The Long Island native performed the closing show at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in August 2015 before the Uniondale, New York, arena was closed for renovations. Fittingly, Joel brought out several military men for the Vietnam War epic “Goodnight Saigon” before ending with a rousing reminder that “Only the Good Die Young.” Two years later, the resident keyboard king also rocked the reopening of Nassau Coliseum in April 2017.
