Billy Joel
American singer-songwriter and pianist
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Billy Joel's Keyboards and Synthesizers
"In The '80s, Billy's live choice of piano was a Yamaha CP-80, an electric grand piano marketed in the late 1970s and 1980s and popularized by Genesis, Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins, Simple Minds and U2, and revived by Keane in The Oughties. Joel brought a CP-80 to his historic 1987 concerts in Russia. Angered by security harassing the dancing audience members, and hoping to distract the guards and raise a ruckus, Joel threw the (relatively) light and compact CP-80 offstage (not towards any audience members) to much controversy"
In this article and video, it is stated that Billy Joel uses a Kurzweil PC2x keyboard.
"The main keyboard he's using a Kurzweil K2600X," says Billy Joel's tech in this video, at 0:20.
Billy begins playing both the piano and the Moog to his right at 0:38. This setup was used by Joel in other songs performed from this night in Connectitcut (1976), and can be seen in other videos from this concert.
We can see Billy Joel playing a Korg M1 during This David Letterman appearance from 1993. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f_7YhghqpQ
"We recently caught up with Billy Joel's longtime keyboardist and technologist David Rosenthal, who graciously let us onstage for a tour of his all-new rig. His familiar stage keyboards--including Kurzweil K2600X and K2661 workstations and a Roland Fantom-G6, are now mainly used as controllers..." - Robbie Gennet, Keyboard magazine.
Here Billy can be seen playing an O1/W ProX on Pressure. On the River of Dreams Tour, as well as on the Storm Front Tour, Billy can be seen playing a number of different Korg workstations, including the M1, T1, and T2.
At this college appearance at Hobart and Williams Billy can be seen playing a Kurzweil PC1x.
kurzweil micropiano is on the piano during the concert 2000 at MADISON SQUARE GARDEN
This is a community-built gear list for Billy Joel.
- Find relevant music gear like Microphones, Pianos, Keyboards and Synthesizers, and other instruments and add it to Billy Joel.
- The best places to look for gear usage are typically on the artist's social media, YouTube, live performance images, and interviews.
- To receive email updates when Billy Joel is seen with new gear, follow the artist.