Billy Joel’s SiriusXM Channel to Air Hits, Rarities and Interviews
After teasing his upcoming SiriusXM channel on The Tonight Show, Billy Joel officially announced the launch of The Billy Joel Channel featuring music and interviews from the singer’s 50-year career. The channel goes live at 6 p.m. ET on March 26th and will run through June 25th via satellite on channel 4, online and through the SiriusXM Internet Radio App.
The Billy Joel Channel will play music from throughout the pianist’s career, starting with his mid-1960s work with The Echoes to the myriad classics he recorded as a solo artist. The channel will also feature cuts from his upcoming live album, A Matter of Trust: The Bridge to Russia, documenting Joel’s 1987 Russian tour (you’ll be able to hear the entire album, plus bonus material, on SiriusXM the day it drops, May 20th). Amidst the hits, the channel will air plenty of rarities and previously unreleased live and studio cuts from Joel’s earliest days as a performer.
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You’ll also get to hear Joel discuss his legendary career and historic, ongoing Madison Square Garden residency, which finds the musician playing the arena once a month for the indefinite future. The channel will also air chats with member’s of Joel’s touring band, as well as archival interviews with the musician himself and excerpts from his “Masters Class” sessions, which he holds with music students around the world.
When Joel teased the SiriusXM station on The Tonight Show, he told Jimmy Fallon, “I guess they want me to program some music that I like to listen to and talk about what we like to listen to on the road or what we do. I don’t know. I guess I’m going to wing it.” Joel also stuck around to perform “You May Be Right,” which Fallon crashed with some mighty air-saxophone.
Joel also spoke about shaking things up during his monthly Madison Square Garden gigs, saying, “I don’t ever want to do the same show twice. We’re bringing in some of the more obscure songs, but we do enough of the hits and songs that people know and stuff that we like to do. We’re making it up all the time.” Proving his point, the Piano Man recently brought out Brian Johnson for a special cover of AC/DC‘s “You Shook Me All Night Long.”