Billy Joel’s residency at Madison Square Garden ends in July 2024, but he’s not mothballing the tour bus just yet.
At the Nov. 21 preview of the Long Island Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame’s career retrospective, Billy Joel: My Life — A Piano Man’s Journey, the veteran entertainer told the crowd, “I’m not leaving [touring]. We’ll still do the work — we’re just not going to keep working in the same place. We’re going to different places.”
My Life is a journey down the long, eventually illustrious career of Long Island’s favorite son, who was born in the Bronx, grew up in the Oyster Bay hamlet of Levittown and went on to score 42 Billboard Hot 100 hits — 13 in the top 10, and three of them No. 1s — and who holds the record for the most number of performances at New York’s Madison Square Garden: 136. The LIMEHoF exhibit, which is located at the Stony Brook Village Center, includes a program from Joel’s first piano recital, at the age of 12 in 1961; his personal book of lyrics; instruments from one of his first bands, The Hassles; a seat ripped from one of Joel’s 1987 concerts in the Soviet Union that is autographed by band members (Joel’s inscription reads, “Swimsuits!”); eight-track tapes and picture-sleeve 45s of his albums and singles; gold and platinum albums of his hits, and the nine-foot grand piano he played on his Face to Face Tour with Elton John.
“Where is Elton, by the way?” Joel asked the crowd with a smile. “He’s retiring [from live performances], but I think he’ll show up somewhere again.”
The exhibit’s designers said that approximately half of the exhibit’s memorabilia came from Joel and the rest from fans when they learned it was planned. During the preview, guests could be seen pointing out their donations to friends.
Joel, who was wearing a Deus Ex Machina Custom Motorcyles cap, said that though those gathered may have seen his Oyster Bay home for sale — not his childhood residence, a 26-acre estate listed at $49 million, although it reportedly is no longer on the market — he was not leaving Long Island. “This is my home; it will always be my home. We will always have this as our home — and we’ll come and visit this place a lot.”
“It’s a little overwhelming. Have you ever found yourself surrounded by you? It’s kind of a nightmare,” he told the crowd before concluding, “I guess I’ve lived.”
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