Elton, Billy, & Ethan - The Piano Men

Date night!

This is becoming the BEST summer I have ever had. Last night was one of those reasons why. Oops, one of the Best, 15 years ago was not too shabby either (Bill!) and 13 years ago was pretty good too, (Kyle!) For Ethan's birthday (which was in May) Bill and I got him tickets to see Elton John and Billy Joel. We only got 2 tickets in case he didn't want to go (I know that would be just crazy!). Good thing we did though because Bill is out of town at a conference (anxiously awaiting my arrival!). Bill and I saw Billy and Elton right after our honeymoon and they were really good, but this was even better. It could be just the pure joy of seeing your little boy's eyes light up to something and enjoying it like it's the first time.

So with the help of Whitney babysitting everyone else, and Gretchen taking the girls to dance, Ethan and I were off for the date of the year. It was fabulous! Thanks to Gretchen having worked at the arena awhile back, she was able to call into her friends and request an upgrade of our seats. We were going to be a little high up but, you take what you can get. The most important thing was we were going! Well, we got upgraded to awesome seats. You can see by the pictures. I have a great zoom but really could not have achieved these pictures without the great seats to take them from.

Ethan was excited for days to go and he had a wonderful time. He loves Billy and Elton, knows all their songs and history and facts. He has read books on them, studied them on-line, listened to every sample of their songs on i-tunes and downloaded many. Since starting piano last fall he has really zipped along in his lessons and it was great for him to see these guys pound out song after song. He even has a Billy Joel beginning piano book!

I insisted he have a program book, everyone needs one of those! He turned me down on a t-shirt so I made him help me pick one and told him we would share, that it would make a good shirt to sleep in. Hopefully he'll change his mind on that and be glad we have one.

I have to admit that I had tears in my eyes with the last song, Piano Man, the line "to forget about life for awhile". We needed a night to forget about life for awhile and we did!


Ethan can give more picture detail when he wakes up. We were so keyed up when we got home he did not go to bed until 1:30. They started playing at 7:45 and stopped a little after 11 with no breaks! We didn't get home until 12:15, good thing he is a night owl! I will add more detail later.



The pianos rose up from under the stage and we knew we were in for a great night!



Elton and Billy greet and the night gets started.

This is from my old camera's zoom, thank you thank you Gretchen and your arena buddies!

We love you Elton. Crocodile Rock was awesome!

Not only did we have great seats but we sat right under the big screens so we didn't miss a thing!

Goodby Yellow Brick Road

There is nothing like Elton John and his fab wardrobe.

Pianos, guitars, harmonicas - oh my!

The microphone stand tricks during It's Still Rock and Roll to Me, put a huge smile on Ethan's face. He loved this song!



Both Billy and Elton did some piano standing this was when Billy jumped over to Elton's, it was pretty cool.

Face to Face 2009, literally




Thank you Ethan for a wonderful night together, you will always be my Piano Man.