Billy Joel at Madison Square Garden

“Don’t get your knickers in a twist. I’m not Mick Jagger”

–Billy Joel, Madison Square Garden, June 8, 2024

When Billy Joel announced that he was ending his decade-long stint as an artist in residence at Madison Square Garden, I spent the next couple of days on StubHub making sure that I got a pair of tickets. I’d wanted to see him in concert for the past five years at least and never got around to it. 

With Bill being in his 70s and his residency about to wrap up, I really couldn’t afford to drag my feet on seeing him in concert.

He was scheduled to give 150 performances and my cousin Olivia and I went to see number 149. We were seated behind the stage, watching it on a partially-obscured jumbotron, but we could hear everything perfectly. 

It was a pretty good crowd for a Saturday (wink, wink). Everyone else was about a quarter century older than us, but you’re never too young to appreciate good music. A juicy crowd showed up to see him perform and once the crowd had fattened up enough, he took to the stage to earsplitting applause.

He performed with such assuredness, making it look easy. For the record, he is also very funny, telling us that his eyes were leaky because he was 74 (the crowd cheered for this fact) and that his eyes started leaking when he announced his retirement from Madison Square Garden, causing numerous news outlets to report that he was crying. 

I did a lot of off-pitch singing and shaky camera work throughout the night. My personal favorite of his has always been Vienna, which he did almost right out the gate. On more than one occasion, I thought I was going to cry, but kept it together through Vienna and New York State of Mind. 

He’s gotten over his aversion to performing Uptown Girl, which he did about midway through. His 8 year old daughter, Bella joined him on stage for several of his songs, rolling around the piano and the floor, while her dad performed above her head. 

Finally, as the night started to wind down, he sat at his piano with a harmonica and did “Piano Man.” On the line “it’s a pretty big crowd for a Saturday” the audience went wild.

At one point during the chorus, he stopped playing and listened to us sing his song to him. He listened to us shout “sing us a song, you’re the piano man, sing us a song tonight, because we’re all in the mood for a melody, and you’ve got us feeling alright.”

Afterwards, he exited the stage to chants of “BILLY! BILLY!” and then returned to give an encore of We Didn’t Start the Fire, It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me, and a whole smattering of others. 

He played all of his hits, except for Just the Way You Are, but I will live with this.

Olivia and I left shortly thereafter, our ears ringing, as we weaved through the throngs of people selling fake, overpriced Billy Joel t-shirts outside. I bought a “149th” concert t-shirt that will serve as a pretty comfortable sleep-shirt for years to come.

So, what to say to sum it all up when you’ve witnessed a rock-and-roll legend giving one of their final performances at one of the most famous venues in the world? I can’t sum it all up; I can hardly even describe it. I just enjoy the memory of having seen it and remind myself of how lucky I am to have done so.

Olivia and I walked away from Madison Square Garden, in a New York state of mind. 

The Tragic Queen,

Raquel