“He’s never comfortable in a room until he sees a piano.” —A fond observation about Billy Joel from lighting designer Steve Cohen
This has been a bumper year for bio-documentaries, and one of the most memorable is Billy Joel: And So It Goes, a five-hour tour through the life and career of the accomplished recording artist. Director Susan Lacy coaxed Joel into several interviews to share his history and his reflections at age 76. And when Lacy gained his trust, Billy let his story flow: the good, the bad, the terrible, and the incredible.
William Martin “Billy” Joel was gifted with an endless aptitude for music: a strong singing voice, a talent for composing, and the magical ability to play many instruments. But the piano is his signature. If you’ve ever played piano, you practiced those tedious exercises that taught you scales, keys, and timing. Billy probably started out like the rest of us, but he caught on faster. Playing organ in a band in his tender teens, sporting a long, curly, Captain Hook hairdo, he started composing songs and getting paid to perform. What started out as a side job would launch a career that featured him in Carnegie Hall. And So It Goes portrays the making of an original and nationally acclaimed artist who performed around the world.
To this day, the baby grand is Joel’s comfort zone. He seems like he was born sitting on a piano bench. Those black and white keys are extensions of his fingers and hands. Everything runs on auto pilot, especially since he forgot how to read music, not that it matters. Reading notation would probably just slow him down.
The most important people in his life include Jon Small—his best friend and music partner since their teen band, the Hassles—and the amazing Elizabeth Weber, Joel’s first of four wives, and maybe the love of his life, originally married to Jon Small. Confessing to Jon was one of the worst days in Billy’s life. Billy parted ways with Elizabeth, attempted suicide, and was admitted to a mental ward, a nightmare that snapped him out of depression. Eventually, he returned to music and married Elizabeth.
Elizabeth was Billy Joel’s tower of strength and sensibility, with talents of her own. Betrayed by his first manager, Joel appointed his smart, gutsy wife to manage his career. Elizabeth groomed herself into a well-versed alpha female, taking on the rough-and-tumble music industry, never intimidated by Columbia Records, which had signed Billy. These were the days when single records were big sellers, getting radio airtime while generating album sales. Every album needed at least one hit single. And when Billy’s new album, The Stranger, was poised for release, Elizabeth insisted “Just the Way You Are” would be a hot single, while Columbia wanted to remove it from the album. But it became Joel’s first top 10 single, winning two Grammys.
Joel also shares his dark family history. His parents had a good life in Germany until Hitler renounced citizenship for all Jewish residents. The Joels abandoned their lucrative business and barely escaped to America, settling in the Bronx and then Long Island. But Joel’s father hated America for its lack of culture. When Billy was eight, his parents divorced, Dad returned to Europe, and Mom raised Billy and his sister alone. When Billy was older, he visited his dad in Vienna, hoping to make a connection. But the reunion was awkward, with no sense of family. Maybe Dad just wasn’t a warm and fuzzy guy. But Billy would forever feel unloved.
Billy Joel’s 13 albums (including one classical) feature about 120 songs that appeal to many tastes. The poetic lyrics of “Piano Man,” his memoir as the piano player in a Los Angeles bar, was his signature that kept audiences singing along. Among his adventurous compositions are the a cappella-style “The Longest Time,” and the daring “Only the Good Die Young,” which soared to the top of the charts after the Vatican tried to ban it. For my money, Joel’s most perfect and universal composition is his romantic anthem “New York State of Mind.”
Billy Joel could be fun and self-deprecating, playful and funny. And his lyrics bring out his romantic side. But he also had anger. Sometimes he ends his concerts with the warning, “Don’t take any sh— from anybody.” Maybe that’s a reflexive instruction, blaming himself for not staying alert to betrayals, for stressing over music critics who concluded he didn’t fit the popular music mold, or regretting his search for solace in a bottle, an addiction that ended three of his four marriages. None of us is perfect. And when you’re Billy Joel, everything is fuel for a song.
Streaming on several services, this two-part HBO documentary includes excerpts from live performances throughout his career, observations from famous musicians, and an entertaining episode about meeting his second wife, Christie Brinkley. Billy Joel is on temporary hiatus for health reasons. But whenever he retires, he can feel gratified that he went out with a bang, after performing at Madison Square Garden every month for ten straight years to sold-out crowds.
Joel’s ongoing contemplation is whether musical talents are genetically shared. His father, Howard Joel, was an accomplished classical pianist; Billy’s half-brother, Charles Alexander Joel, is a British-German pianist and conductor. And Alexa, daughter of Joel and Christie Brinkley, is a singer-songwriter and pianist. Joel may not have found the answer, but here’s what we do know: however Billy Joel got his talent, it was an extraordinary dose.