One Final Serenade: Songs of Billy Joel
"Where's The Orchestra?" is one of Billy's finest songs. It is a wistful and philosophical song about life and about arriving as an adult, only to find that there is no music, no orchestra. At the end of the day, after the closing lines and curtain calls, the curtain falls on empty chairs. As Billy states: "It's basically, on one level it sounds like a guy sitting in a theater, figuring he went to see a musical and it turns out just to be a straight play, and he's saying, 'OK, I got it, I hear the dialogue, I see what the actors are doing. Give me a song. You know, entertain me.' And it's sort of a symbol for, you know, you get to a certain point in life and you go, well life isn't a musical, it's a play. And it sort of seemed to sum up the album. I understand, da da da da da, I paid my dues, right and, this is the way life is, but... where's the orchestra?" See blog post by Cosmic American. Billy on"Where's The Orchestra" (SiriusXM)
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Where's the orchestra? Wasn't this supposed to be a musical? Here I am In the balcony, How the hell could I have missed the overture? I like the scenery Even though, I have absolutely no, idea at all, What is being said, despite the dialogue, There's the leading man The movie star who never faced an audience Where's the orchestra? After all, this is my big night on the town My introduction to the theatre crowd I assumed that the show would have a song So I was wrong At least I understand All the innuendo and the irony And I appreciate, The roles the actors played The point the author made And after the closing lines, And after the curtain calls, The curtain falls On empty chairs, Where's the orchestra? 
Edgar Degas' "Musicians in the Orchestra" (1872).
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But it is hard to label this allegory a depressing song, rather it is a both a lovely and a plaintive rumination about life. The singer accepts that he was wrong about whether the "show" (i.e., life) would have a song, and at least he understands and appreciates the nuances of the show, the innuendo and the irony of life. Maybe life is lonely, and in the end we all really do die alone among "empty chairs" and there is no orchestra even though we thought there would be be one ("I assumed that a show would have a song, so I was wrong"), yet the irony is that life does have a song, namely, this one and the many other songs about life that Billy has penned.
Musically the song has a wistful almost elegiac tone; Billy himself has said that it reminds him of Harry Nilsson's music. The song was recorded by Billy without his regular band, but instead with a chamber orchestra led by a conductor, with a cello, clarinet, accordion, and saxophone (Eddie Daniels), and Billy on the piano. The recording was also done to separate the stereo playback so that Billy's voice is separate from the orchestra, which is appropriate given the title and theme of the song.
At the end of the song, the opening strain to "Allentown" comes in again, tying the whole album together. In a live version from MTV's Night School in 1982 (see video below, right), Billy goes right into a few bars of "Allentown."
For serious Billy Joel fans "Where's The Orchestra?" represents the best of Billy Joel, music and lyrics that complement each other and take the listener to another place and inside one's self. It is an appropriate ending to Billy's most ambitious album. One expert on Billy Joel, Christie Brinkley, has said that "Where's The Orchestra" was her favorite Billy Joel song (not "Uptown Girl"). Good choice.
New York singer-songwriter Julian Velard covered the song on his 2014 album If You Don't Like It, You Can Leave. Listen to his cover here and read an article about it from Ultimate Classic Rock. Why did Velard chose this song, as opposed to a more well-known Billy Joel song? As Velard stated in the article: "People should know that outside his songs about Brenda and Eddie and Mr. Cacciatore, Billy Joel is (arguably the last) in the line of the great American song tradition that was born in NYC and was the zenith of popular culture in the first half of the 20th century. This song is proof.”
At the end of the song, the opening strain to "Allentown" comes in again, tying the whole album together. In a live version from MTV's Night School in 1982 (see video below, right), Billy goes right into a few bars of "Allentown."
For serious Billy Joel fans "Where's The Orchestra?" represents the best of Billy Joel, music and lyrics that complement each other and take the listener to another place and inside one's self. It is an appropriate ending to Billy's most ambitious album. One expert on Billy Joel, Christie Brinkley, has said that "Where's The Orchestra" was her favorite Billy Joel song (not "Uptown Girl"). Good choice.
New York singer-songwriter Julian Velard covered the song on his 2014 album If You Don't Like It, You Can Leave. Listen to his cover here and read an article about it from Ultimate Classic Rock. Why did Velard chose this song, as opposed to a more well-known Billy Joel song? As Velard stated in the article: "People should know that outside his songs about Brenda and Eddie and Mr. Cacciatore, Billy Joel is (arguably the last) in the line of the great American song tradition that was born in NYC and was the zenith of popular culture in the first half of the 20th century. This song is proof.”
Videos
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A fan video of "Where's The Orchestra?" that consists of this single enigmatic photo by Chris Buck that appeared in Blender Magazine. Read the story behind the photo. Song is © 1982 Sony Music Entertainment.
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Billy sings "Where's The Orchestra" on MTV's Night School (1982).
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