Update 8:45 p.m. Monday April 15: CBS will rerun the entire Billy Joel – The 100th – Live at Madison Square Garden concert which was cut short Sunday by two minutes – in the middle of his “Piano Man” finale – on 9 p.m. on Friday, April 19.
“A network programming timing error ended last night's Billy Joel special approximately two minutes early in the Eastern and Central Time Zones," said Julie Holland, CBS vice president of communications, said in a statement posted on the CBS News website.
“We apologize to Mr. Joel, his fans, our affiliated stations, and our audience whose viewing experience was interrupted during the last song,” she said.
The taped concert, scheduled to start at 9 p.m. Sunday, was delayed more than a half hour because The Masters golf tournament ran long. But after the golf telecast – and before 60 Minutes started CBS’ prime-time lineup – CBS aired a breaking news update on Iran’s attack on Israel. The two-minute news update was not accounted for in the network’s prime-time window, causing the concert to be terminated early.
“Due to the overwhelming demand from his legion of fans," the concert filmed March 28 “will air again in its entirety on Friday, April 19, at 9 p.m.,” the network announced.
Billy Joel – The 100th is also available to Paramount+ subscribers. Monday morning it was available for free viewing at CBS.com.
Original post 10:49 a.m. Monday, April 15: No, Cincinnati’s CBS affiliate WKRC-TV didn’t start the fire. Channel 12 didn’t arbitrarily cut off the final minutes of the Billy Joel concert — the network did. The heavily promoted concert prematurely ended on all CBS affiliates in the Eastern time zone.
“It’s not Local 12’s fault! CBS network cut off the Billy Joel concert!!! We have zero control is (if) the network cuts off the feeds,” WKRC-TV morning anchor Sheila Gray posted on X (formerly Twitter) Monday morning.
CBS had been hyping Billy Joel: The 100th – Live at Madison Square Garden since the Super Bowl. The concert was taped March 28.
The recorded “live” concert abruptly ended while Joel was playing “Piano Man,” his signature 1973 hit, as the grand finale.
The CBS broadcast, scheduled to start at 9 p.m. Sunday, was delayed more than a half hour because The Masters golf tournament ran long. But after the golf telecast — and before 60 Minutes started CBS’ primetime lineup — CBS aired a breaking news brief on Iran’s attack on Israel. The news update was not accounted for in the network’s primetime window, causing the concert to be terminated early, WKRC-TV morning anchor Bob Herzog explained to viewers.
“People were very, very, very mad,” Herzog said during ARC Cincinnati, the revamped 8 a.m. hour of Good Morning Cincinnati, which Herzog hosts with Jen Dalton on WSTR-TV (Channel 64).
All CBS stations in the Eastern and Central time zones missed the final minutes of show, Herzog said.
The network feed went to black in the middle of the song so affiliates could start their delayed 11 p.m. newscasts. As of this writing, CBS has not apologized or explained what happened. However, the network late Sunday night posted the entire concert to view for free at CBS.com.
Herzog indicated that the Channel 12 newsroom phones blew up with complaints from Joel fans Sunday night.
“Don’t call your CBS news station and start cussing out the first person who answers the phone, because they didn’t do it,” Herzog told viewers. “They call, and the words, the vitriol — you would not believe the phone calls people here have to take.”
Herzog urged upset viewers to “hopefully take a breath and think about the important things in life.”
