52nd Street

52nd Street is the 6th studio album by Billy Joel and was released by Columbia Records on October 13, 1978. Serving as the follow-up to his 1976 landmark album, The Stranger, Joel chose to add more jazz influences to give it a distinction.

The title is a reference to 52nd Street, one of New York City’s jazz centers in the middle of the century. It’s not only the same street where the headquarters for Joel’s label, Columbia, was located at (in the CBS Building) at the time of the album’s release, but also the same street of the studio where recording took place, one block away from the CBS Building.

It became the first of four albums by Joel to peak at #1 on the Billboard 200 and won 2 Grammies, including Album of the Year.