Photo by Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images
It’s time to update Billy Joel‘s resume and add “Steinway Hall of Fame Inductee” to the awards and recognitions section.
The Piano Man became the first non-classical musician inducted into the Steinway Hall of Fame during a ceremony held in New York City yesterday, which included hanging a portrait of the Bronx born Joel next to many of his idols.
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The portrait was unveiled in the Manhattan showroom of Steinway & Sons piano company yesterday and displays Joel in his Long Island home in a favorite leather jacket, standing next to his piano.
“You know I found that jacket in a little shop in Miami Beach,” Joel said. “It was the first time I had gone shopping, without a girlfriend or a wife, for clothes. Guys, you know what I mean… I thought it looked cool. I wore it to a lot of different places and recently I was going to wear that jacket out to dinner with my girlfriend and she said, ‘Are you going to wear that Members Only jacket?’ I said, ‘What’s a Members Only jacket?’ And she said, ‘They went out in the ’80s.’”
“So I’m glad you have my arms folded over the Members Only logo,” Joel told Wyse at the ceremony.
Joel’s portrait hangs alongside other greats who have tickled ivory, including Vladimir Horowitz, one of his idols.
“I don’t know how crazy he’d be about having me that close to him,” said Joel. “I ran into him once on the street, on Madison Avenue, back in the ’70s… I saw Vladimir Horowitz walking across the street. I had long hair and a black leather jacket and I said, ‘Maestro!’ and he thought I was gonna mug him. He kinda ran away so this is the closest I’ve been to him since then.”
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