词条 | Joel, Billy |
释义 | Joel, Billy American musician in full William Martin Joel born May 9, 1949, Bronx, N.Y., U.S. American singer, pianist, and songwriter in the pop ballad tradition. His greatest popularity was in the 1970s and '80s. The son of a German-Jewish Holocaust survivor but raised as a Roman Catholic in Hicksville, a middle-class suburb on Long Island, N.Y., Joel was steered toward classical music by his parents and began piano lessons at age 4. At age 14, enamoured of the British Invasion and soul music, he began playing in bands. With the Hassels, he recorded two albums in the late 1960s, and a stint in the heavy metal duo Attila followed. In 1971, recast as a singer-songwriter (singer-songwriters), Joel recorded the poorly produced Cold Spring Harbor for Family Productions, which locked him into an exploitative long-term contract. Seeking refuge in Los Angeles, he performed under a pseudonym in a local piano bar. Meanwhile, a live recording of Joel's song "Captain Jack" caught the attention of Columbia Records executives, who extricated him from his contract. His first album for Columbia, Piano Man (1973), featured a hit single of the same name; based on his piano bar experience, it became his signature song. Mixtures of soul, pop, and rock, Piano Man and Joel's subsequent albums—Streetlife Serenade (1974) and Turnstiles (1976)—earned praise from critics and set the stage for The Stranger (1977). Featuring four U.S. hit singles (one of which, "Just the Way You Are," won Grammy Awards for song of the year and record of the year), it sold five million copies, surpassing Simon and Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water to become Columbia's best-selling album to date. ![]() Representative Works ● “Piano Man” (1973) ● Turnstiles (1976) ● The Stranger (1977) ● The Nylon Curtain (1982) ● An Innocent Man (1983) |
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