Description

I’m sure that most everyone has played this game at one time or another: Put on a CD (or LP, so that you really CAN drop the needle) of music from an unexpected source, and then have your friends figure out either (a) what the music is or (b) who is playing it. Or (c) “all of the above.”There was a time – when I spent more time listening to music than I now do – when I was pretty good at this. But I would have failed miserably on this new Billy Joel album. As did a few friends of mine when I recently tried it on them; the album is the “perfect party record&#more…8221; for this game, in fact. One friend (a classically trained pianist who had studied with Rudoph Serkin) had no trouble identifying some of the more obvious influences (Chopin, Schumann, Liszt), but missed (or perhaps by then had thrown in the towel) on others (Bach, Rachmaninoff, Scarlatti, Scriabin). He admitted he would never have figured this for the work of Billy Joel, and was impressed once “the cat was out of the bag.”The fact that this Serkin-trained friend had been first perplexed and then amazed speaks volumes about what Billy Joel has accomplished here (apparently during an eight-year hiatus when he didn’t write any pop stuff). Joel deserves a lot of credit for these works, which are more substantial – and more difficult – than they at first appear. And, because these “etudes” are not as simple as one might expect, he also deserves credit for not making this a “vanity” release by endeavoring to perform them himself. His keyboardist of choice – Richard Joo – is quite fine, and more than up to the technical demands, which are far from trivial.It is all too easy to be dismissive of the effort here, coming as it does from Sony, the label that is “king of classical crossover.” The works deserve to be taken seriously; they’re really more than a few notches above “just another classical crossover effort.” While Joel may have, consciously or otherwise, meant to pay tribute to his earlier musical training, the fact remains that these works stand on their own. And stand up very well under repeated hearings.Billy Joel’s pop-rocker fans may react negatively to this earnest effort on his part to seek fresh musical challenges, and, possibly, find a new audience. But that’s not my problem; I enjoyed it immensely.Finally, I – perhaps like others – was attracted to this release in the first place not because of the music, or the composer, but because of the cover art. Sheer whimsy! And nothing wrong with that, either.

Tracks

---

Info:

Category:

Music > Albums

Case Type:

CD

Release Type:

Retail

Comments:

1    read    add

---

Cover Info:

Title:

Billy Joel - Fantasies & Delusions (2001) Retail CD

Part:

Front

Dimensions:

937 x 928 px

Size:

313 KB

Downloads:

607 (0 today)

Uploaded:

Report a Problem Wrong Cover Duplicate Image Bad Quality Wrong Info

07/05/07 by elejoe

Quality Rating:

• Currently 5/5 Stars.
• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5

Rated 5 of 5 (1 votes). Click CDs to vote!

---

Other Available Parts: