Joel, Billy

William Martin "Billy" Joel (born May 9, 1949) is a singer, songwriter and pianist. He recorded a huge number of rock hits from 1973 (beginning with the single "Piano Man") to his retirement from recording pop music in 1993. more...

He is one of the very few pop artists to have Top Ten hits in the '70s, '80s, and '90s. A six-time Grammy Award winner, he has sold in excess of 100 million records worldwide and is the sixth best selling artist in the United States, according to the RIAA. Joel's induction into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame (Class of 1992), and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (Class of 1999) has further solidified his status as one of America's leading music icons. He has continued to tour occasionally (usually with Elton John) in addition to writing and recording classical music.

Early years

Joel "was born in '49, a Cold War kid in McCarthy time," as he wrote in his song "Leningrad." Joel first lived in the modern-day South Bronx, New York, an ethnically white neighborhood at the time. His family then moved to Long Island, to Levittown and then to Hicksville, both working class towns in Nassau County . His father, Howard Joel, was a Jewish Holocaust survivor from Germany and his mother, Rosalind Nyman, was born in England, to an agnostic Jewish family. His parents later divorced, and his father moved back to Eastern Europe. His half-brother Alexander Joel is also a musician.

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