Billy Joel - Scenes from an Italian Restaurant (Jazz Fest 2013 - AXSTV)

In 2013, Billy Joel performed at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Watch here as Billy and his band perform 'Scenes From An Italian Restaurant' off his 1977 album The Stranger.

Although 'Scenes From An Italian Restaurant' was never released as a single, the song has become one of Billy Joel's most celebrated compositions among fans, appearing on most of his compilation albums and a live favourite. In an interview, Joel cites the second side of The Beatles' album Abbey Road as one of its primary musical influences.

In a performance at C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University on May 6, 1977, just before the song's official release, Joel dedicated that performance to Christiano's, a restaurant in the nearby hamlet of Syosset, which operated until February 2014.

The song's signature line: "A bottle of red, a bottle of white, whatever kind of mood you're in tonight" was actually spoken to him by a waiter at Fontana di Trevi while Billy Joel ordered. Fontana di Trevi, a restaurant across from Carnegie Hall, which Joel frequented during a series of June 1977 concerts, was the actual restaurant that inspired the song.



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