Billy Joel’s 40-Year Solo Career Commemoration CD Special Releases

Available TODAY!!  November 8, 2011

Columbia/Legacy Recordings, a division of Sony Music Entertainment, is commemorating 40 years of Billy Joel’s career as a solo recording artist with a pair of historic releases:

• A limited edition Billy Joel - The Complete Albums Collection 15 cd boxed set an
• A 2-disc Legacy Edition Piano Man, Joel's debut album.

Sony has sent me one copy of the 2-disc Legacy Edition to review and one copy to Give Away!

Find details on how to win this 2-disc Legacy Edition -- which includes the previously unreleased legacy concert held live at Sigma Sound Studios in '72 -- at the bottom of this post.

That's right, the much cited WMMR live studio concert at Sigma Sound Studios with Ed Sciaky from April 15, 1972, 19 months before Billy Joel signed with Columbia Records and launched his career has just now been released for the very first time.
This previously unreleased set has rocked my world this week.

When I popped this cd into my car stereo.....
and heard the fairly unknown William Martin Joel in a small studio talking, singing and joking with the live audience, humbly performing his now-famous songs with banjos, dobros, fiddles and harmonica, and telling his background stories in his young voice, I felt like it was just him and me, jamming in my living room.  I listened as he "introduced" these "new" songs that I've been listening to for 35 years.  I felt like he was right there playing for me and nervously asking me, "Hey, do you think this will be a hit?"

If you're a Billy Joel fan, you need to hear this Sigma Sounds Studios Performance.   You'll get chills as you hear Joel's mind rambling as he navigates entertaining the live audience, the taped version and the radio audience.  And then he jokes, "We're making the Best of Billy Joel album" when at that point, there were no successful Billy Joel albums. 

When I got home, I had my husband and two friends join me on the back patio after dark with dim lighting and cricket noises and I played the Sigma Sounds disc for them.  That's how special it is.  You need a proper setting in which to hear it.  Then hear it again.  And again.  The third time I heard it, I was driven to go find the original Piano Man record in our record collection:

Our old vinyl albums along with our old cassettes are taking a beating these days.  I was astounded to find only three Billy Joel original albums, we've been robbed!!!

We have the Piano Man on cassette and of course on cd, but I was disappointed not to find the record album.  After Piano Man, Joel skyrocketed into the “sensitive singer-songwriters" category with Linda Ronstadt, James Taylor, Jackson Browne and Elton John.  All of which I am a student.  35 years later, these guys are still on the top of my playlist, they are pure genius.

Columbia Records released Joel's debut album Piano Man on November 9, 1973.  Today they are releasing this 2-disc Legacy Edition of Piano Man which includes the 10-song original album in its entirety, re-mastered for this release in addition to a second disc premiering the first-ever release of Billy's mythic performance at Philadelphia's Sigma Sound Studio, which I described above.  It contains 3 Billy Joel songs -- "Long, Long Time," "Josephine" and "Rosalinda" -- which do not appear on any other albums.  It also contains 9 other songs you are very familiar with, including "Captain Jack" and "The Ballad of Billy the Kid."

To Win your own 2-disc Legacy Edition Piano Man, leave a comment here as well as emailing a comment to PlanetPookie@yahoo.com so I can have an email address to notify the winner.  The email address will not be and never will be used for anything else.Winner will be chosen Sunday, Nov. 13, 2011.

Go to BillyJoel.com to purchase this 2-disc set or the 15-disc Complete Album Collection boxed set. 

You can preview and purchase the songs at Amazon on this affiliate link:

Disclosure:  I received my own copy of the Legacy Edition Piano Man in exchange for this review.  No other compensation was received.  If you purchase through my Amazon link, I receive a few pennies or something on my Affiliate Acct.