piano man essays

piano man essays For my final project, after a lot of research and decision making, I chose Piano Man by Billy Joel. I believe this self-titled record, Piano Man, is truly a magnificent piece of art work, and is a must in everybody's music collection. William Martin Joel was born in the Bronx on May 9, 1949, and was raised in Long Island, New York. At the age of four, Joel began taking piano lessons after his parents noticed his fascination in classical music. He joined his first band about 12 years later, and was known to frequently play the piano in nightclubs. Since then, Billy Joel has recorded 12 albums. Since the beginning of his career, he has received five Grammy's. He was also inducted into the Song Writers Hall of Fame in 1992. Piano Man was recorded in 1971, and was the first song and title track to Joel's break through album, which was released by Columbia Records in 1973. By November of 1986, the album went double platinum. Piano Man was written by Billy Joel, and recorded with essentially with the usage of a piano, harmonica, as well as vocals, which were of Joel himself. This is an electrifying melody that was inspired by Joels experience playing at the Executive Room, which was a piano bar in Los Angeles. The theme of the song is basically of regular customers shuffling through the piano bar on a routine basis, especially Saturday nights, while they enjoy the music and slowly get intoxicated, trying to escape life for a while. From the beginning of the song to the end, Joel seems to describe characters based on real characters that he encountered while working at the Executive Bar. For example, Paul the real estate novelist was about a real estate broker that was writing a book, and there is Davy who's still in the navy, and probably will be for life is a young man that is in the service. The song continues to describe various characters in the bar scene as Billy ...