Scenes from an Italian Restaurant
Annotated Bibliography
“Billy Joel Timeline.” Billy Joel Official Site, Sony Music Entertainment, 5 Mar. 2018, www.billyjoel.com/timeline/.
This page depicts a detailed timeline of Billy Joel’s personal and professional life within the music scene, beginning with his birth in 1949, up through his Super Bowl performance of the National Anthem in 2007. Beyond the timeline, there is a lengthy list of awards that Joel has received throughout his career, describing the specific award, what it was for, and the year in which he received it (for a few of them). This is a great baseline source for general information about Joel’s life and important career moments to look into further for more specific details. It’s also very helpful to have a list of his awards in one place as to not have to go searching for them all over the internet.
Marchese, David. “Billy Joel on His Songwriting Silence, the Country Today, and His Ideal Farewell.” Vulture, Vulture, 23 July 2018, www.vulture.com/2018/07/billy-joel-in-conversation.html.
This written interview is very lengthy and full of very interesting tidbits straight from the mouth of Joel and transcribed on this page. It’s very interesting to hear his take on his music and his performances as an aging musician amid a changing landscape of contemporary artists, bad criticisms he has agreed with, and even what he considers one of his best lyrics (from River of Dreams of all albums). This source is very useful because it covers a variety of topics with answers directly from Joel himself, cutting out the secondary-source writers.
Wawzenek, Bryan. “Why Billy Joel Hated His First Album, 'Cold Spring Harbor'.” Ultimate Classic Rock, Ultimate Classic Rock, 27 Oct. 2020, www.ultimateclassicrock.com/billy-joel-cold-spring-harbor/.
This article, I looked for specifically because it’s a story I have found very interesting for a while. It briefly tells the story of Joel’s failed bands and attempted suicide before he attempted to be a professional musician again, leading to the creation of his first commercial album, Cold Spring Harbor. When this album was first released, the records were not created correctly and, in the end,, on the original pressings (one of which I own), his voice is sped up slightly, making him sound like “the Chipmunks”. He responded to this by throwing the record he had “like a frisbee”. This is such an interesting anecdote that relates to Joel’s personal connection to his career with his attempt at suicide and his beginnings as a finally professional musician, even if it wasn’t the ideal sound he wanted to hear from the finished product.
WarmerMusicVideos. Billy Joel Interview 1977, WarmerMusicVideos, 17 Dec. 2015, www.youtube.com/watch?v=AljfNsA6t30.
This video is of a 1977 interview with a 27 year old Billy Joel in which he talks about other icons within the culture of the time. He speaks on the people he has been compared to and how he differs and he explains how he came up with the opening portion of The Ballad of Billy the Kid from his Piano Man album. While only a short, under 4 minute clip, it displays the effortlessness of young Joel to associate his piano playing in order to answer interview questions. It’s quite entrancing to watch him at his prime, just a young man with a natural talent.
Fekadu, Mesfin. “Bruce Springsteen Surprises Audience at Billy Joel Concert.” AP NEWS, Associated Press, 19 July 2018, www.apnews.com/article/1cf530c3fe4d43559cf6b75a7e7c8abf.
This article essentially details the surprise two song performance between Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen during Joel’s 100th performance at Madison Square Garden. This article helped kill two birds with one stone: it gives an example of Joel’s career-long collaborations and good relations with other musicians of his stature as well as it describes an amazing achievement of Joel’s in playing 100 shows at Madison Square Garden, helped by his monthly residency there since 2014.
Album Reviews, Aphoristic. “Billy Joel.” Aphoristic Album Reviews, 18 Mar. 2021, albumreviews.blog/reviews/1970s-album-reviews/billy-joel/.
This is one of two fan-made album review websites I utilized. This reviewer was a little more critical of some of Joel’s work in ways that I didn’t always agree with, but I thought it important to use them as an example of how other fans view Joel’s music. The portion I centered on specifically was Aphoristic’s review of Joel’s first album, Cold Spring Harbor, in which it was given a 3/10. Shameful. But valid points were made, so I saw it important to use from a critical lens.
Murashev, Dmitry. “Billy Joel.” DM's Rock Music Site, 2012, www.murashev.com/dmdl/Billy_Joel.
This was the second, fan-made album review site I used to gauge fan consensus on Billy Joel’s albums. I discovered over many websites, that The Stranger is widely regarded as Joel’s greatest album, which makes sense. It was the album that really shot him to fame quicker than ever and got him Grammy nominations. Otherwise, many of the other ratings and reviews between the websites were pretty similar, although this site was a little nicer to Cold Spring Harbor.
Zwickel, Jonathan. “Elton John & Billy Joel: One's Hot, the Other's Not.” The Seattle Times, The Seattle Times Company, 30 Oct. 2009, www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/elton-john-billy-joel-ones-hot-the-others-not/.
]This website, I used for the purpose of showing how people compare Billy Joel to other artists, in this case, specifically Elton John, which is who he is compared to the most. The author of this website essentially assigned them points based on who won each section, the sections being based on things like songwriting, voice, piano talent, and so on. This website and many others annoyed me, because I’ve always hated how much everyone wants to compare the two artists, but it’s still important to talk about when discussing Joel from a critical point of view.
“‘Piano Man’ Billy Joel.” YouTube, 22 July 2018, youtu.be/WxJNb5wA5c4.
This video is a CBS Sunday Morning piece from the week of Billy Joel’s 100th show at Madison Square Garden in which he performed with guest star Bruce Springsteen (power duo right there). He talks about a bunch of different things like why there is a helipad at his house, his residency with Madison Square Garden, and even the time he wore the Star of David during a show after what happened in Charlottesville in 2017. It’s a very interesting and modern-day interview that also has to do with his historic 100 show achievement at MSG.
Staff, Taste of Country. “7 Years Ago Today: Garth Brooks Honors Billy Joel at Kennedy Center.” Taste of Country, Taste of Country, 29 Dec. 2020, tasteofcountry.com/garth-brooks-billy-joel-covers/.
Another ‘two birds with one stone’ source, this article covers Billy Joel’s honor at the Kennedy Center Honors in 2013 as well as covering Garth Brook being influenced by Billy Joel in his music after being a lifetime fan and cover “Allentown” and “Goodnight Saigon” at the Honors. I wanted to use this article because it discusses a great honor given to Billy Joel, as well as give a little more context to his influence over other musicians and the music scene as a whole.
“One Final Serenade: Songs of Billy Joel.” One Final Serenade: The Songs of Billy Joel (Billy Joel Fan Site), 2021, www.onefinalserenade.com/.
This site is an extremely impressive fan-made website in which on the front page it covers Billy Joel’s musical influence and “timeless and poetic” skills. Also on the website is a page for all of Billy Joel’s songs and albums and each page for each song, gives the lyrics, related images, and long backstory and descriptions about the songs and albums. I used this to display how dedicated the fans of Joel can be when they are affected by his music to such a degree that many have been. It’s actually really impressive and I would recommend giving it a visit and just looking at the page for your favorite Billy Joel song.
Marchut, John H. “The Billy Joel News Blog.” A Billy Joel Photo Website, 2021, www.mylifebillyjoel.com/The_Billy_Joel_Blog.php.
Another fan-made site, John Marchut posts pictures often of Billy Joel photos that are very rare and that you never really see anywhere else. There’s tons and tons of photos catalogued and it’s made all the better when you visit the Contact page and learn about the man. He’s seen Joel play many times and his love for the artist is evident in this website. Like the above website, I also used this one to display the dedication that Joel’s fans have and the influence he has over those who listen to his music and find a deep value to it.
Joel, Billy, director. Billy Joel - Q&A: What Happened To The Hassles And Attila? (Harvard 1994). YouTube, 22 Oct. 2013, youtu.be/YU4PlNNMkEs.
This video, from Billy Joel’s channel, is a clip of a Q&A at Harvard University, in which a student asks him about what happened to two of his early bands, the Hassles and Attila. To the question he responds, saying what they became, video editors, Jesus freaks, dead, and so on. It’s pretty straightforward and I just wanted it for my portfolio as an extra piece on his former bands.
“Billy Joel Interview 1976.” YouTube, 12 Nov. 2017, youtu.be/m2ozPH6vgUk.
This is a GREAT interview. It was recorded in ’76, when Turnstiles released and it goes in depth about how Joel was afraid he was typecast into a role to play after everyone’s association of him with the specific song “Piano Man” and that that was what everyone expected out of all of his music, so he made Streetlife Serenade as a rebellion to the typecast, and it definitely shows. (Love that album). It’s a little bit unfortunate watching it back, because even today, many people still typecast him into a “Piano Man” role.
Billy Joel. Spotify, 2021, open.spotify.com/artist/6zFYqv1mOsgBRQbae3JJ9e.
Pretty Straightforward. This is how I listened to Joel’s music and made my “Essentials” playlist for new listeners to Joel. It’s got the full discography right there and that’s pretty much all there is to it.
Paumgarten, Nick. “Thirty-Three-Hit Wonder.” The New Yorker, 20 Oct. 2014, www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/10/27/thirty-three-hit-wonder.
This article begins written as almost like a fictional story about Billy Joel and his wife and his tennis court helipad and so on. It’s very interesting to read although I didn’t use it in my final piece. Most interviews are very objective but this article, calling Joel a “33-hit wonder” felt like reading a story.