Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		5.0
Video		5.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		5.0

Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 1, 2026

Those whose news feeds receive data from various show business industry publications may have seen the kind of curious reporting a couple of weeks ago about a new planned biopic of Billy Joel called Billy and Me which is supposedly going to document the pre-fame years of the celebrated keyboard playing singer songwriter. As soon as the news of the impending movie came out, Billy himself responded, perhaps surprisingly (given preconceptions about rock stars' egos) deriding the effort and calling it "legally and professionally misguided". Without Joel's imprimatur the film (if it gets made, and it's evidently in pre-production already) will not be able to secure rights to any of the iconic songs Joel has written and performed over the course of a stunning multi decade career. But that's what this inviting concert from Madison Square Garden may be for, as it presents a wide ranging set list that covers at least several large swaths of Billy's writing and performing life.

The performance was captured on March 28, 2024 at Madison Square Garden in New York City, refashioned rather smartly into something approaching a "theater in the round", allowing the audience to surround Billy and the band. The concert includes the following songs, which includes eleven numbers not included in the broadcast version:

• Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway)
• My Life
• Vienna
• The Downeaster 'Alexa'
• An Innocent Man
• The Longest Time
• Turn the Lights Back On


• Interstitial Special Guests is a brief montage documenting some of Billy's guests in previous concerts.


• Big Man on Mulberry Street (featuring Sting)
• Every Little Thing She Does is Magic (featuring Sting)
• Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)
• Half a Mile Away
• The Entertainer
• Don't Ask Me Why
• Allentown


• Interstitial: History of the Garden gives some background on MSG.


• New York State of Mind
• Only the Good Die Young
• Medley: River of Dreams / River Deep - Mountain Hight
• Nessun Dorma
• Scenes From an Italian Restaurant
• Piano Man
• We Didn't Start the Fire
• Uptown Girl
• It's Still Rock and Roll to Me
• Big Shot
• Medley: You May Be Right / Rock and Roll

Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of a consortium including Sony Music with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.00:1. There's some interesting information available here from the good folks at Arri about the capture of this concert by Arri cameras, and while their site may fall victim to a bit of PR hype, there's no doubt that this is a really great looking concert video. Several peripatetic cameras swoop around Billy and the band, and detail levels remain surprisingly fulsome despite some major changes in lighting regimens. Close-ups deliver excellent fine detail on Billy's somewhat weathered face, and fine detail is also crisp enough that even dimly list shots featuring Billy's hands on the keys clearly show some of the little hairs on the back of his hands. The palette is nicely suffused and natural looking throughout. Best of all, at least considering some bugaboos that can accompany live concert videos, this offers a progressive presentation which provides excellent fluidity for faster motions like drumsticks hitting the kit.

Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert features DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and LPCM 2.0 options. The stereo track is full bodied and very well mixed, and some may in fact prefer its more focused and forward approach in terms of some of the vocals. That said, the surround track very noticeably opens up the soundstage (no pun intended) and provides a probably much more accurate accounting of the hall ambience of the gigantic Madison Square Garden. The surround track also offers a more sumptuously spacious presentation of the band material, though perhaps expectedly some of Billy's solo moments at the piano frankly don't sound that much different from the stereo version.

Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no supplements on the disc. The DigiPack includes an insert leaflet with a track list and credits.

Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Billy was just on the cusp of fame shortly after Piano Man (the album) was released, even before the single had really taken off, when he came to Salt Lake City and played a rather small venue in a concert I attended. I was one of "maybe three people" (as Billy himself stated at the concert) who knew about his first album Cold Spring Harbor (which contains an early version of She's Got a Way), and I was delighted when he explained how they had sped up the master making him sound like a chipmunk on that release. The funniest thing he said, though, at least considering the location and the venue, is when he "previewed" a song that wouldn't be officially released until his next album, Streetlife Serenade. As he got ready to launch into Roberta, Billy took a swig of what I have to assume was Jack Daniels or something similar in a shot glass on the piano, looked out and asked, "Hey, Salt Lake City, do you know what a whore is?" That same sly, somewhat self deprecating, sense of humor is on tap here in some of the moments where Billy speaks to the audience, but this is really all about the music, and the good news is despite being well into his AARP years, Billy still sounds surprisingly spry vocally and his piano chops are of course extraordinary. Technical merits are first rate and even without any supplements, Billy Joel: The 100th - Live at Madison Square Garden - The Complete Concert comes Highly recommended.