Who was Howard Joel and what happened to him? Billy Joel opens up about his father and family’s holocaust history

Billy Joel has opened up about his father and his family’s holocaust history in the second part of his HBO documentary, titled And So It Goes.

In May 2025, Joel disclosed his diagnosis of Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus (NPH), a brain disorder. As a result, the two-part docuseries’ co-director, Susan Lacy, told Variety that it was the right time to do the film. The first part of the docuseries debuted on July 17, 2025. The second part is scheduled to be released on July 25, 2025.

The second part explores Billy Joel’s family history, focusing on his father, Helmut (later known as Howard Joel). He came from an elite social class in Germany and was part of a family that ran a textile factory in Nuremberg. Time magazine reported that Joel first learned about his father’s background in his 20s. When Helmut was 10, he was stripped of his rights during the reign of Hitler and was forced out of school, like all Jewish children.

Here is what we know.

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All about Billy Joel’s relationship with his father, Howard Joel and the family’s holocaust history

According to Billy Joel: The Biography, Billy Joel’s grandparents were Karl and Meta Joel, a middle-class Jewish couple. They lived in Nuremberg in Bavaria. Karl was a businessman who launched a European operation in 1928. Joel’s father, Helmut (Howard Joel), was their only child.

In 1935, when Billy Joel was 12, Hitler’s government forced his father to sell his business for pfennig on the deutschmark.

Reflecting on his religious upbringing in Mark Bego’s 2007 biography, Billy Joel said:

“My father got bar mitzvahed and that was it.”

He added:

“They really didn’t go to synagogue. But in Germany, if your family was Jewish you were a Jew.”

Joel further shared how Hitler’s rule at the time impacted his father. He said:

“My dad would look over the fence while they were doing all these antisemitic speeches, and see this going on,” Joel said. “I can’t imagine the trauma to watch the SS parade espousing these principles.”

Billy Joel said his grandparents were fortunate to escape over the Swiss border just in time. He said they fled with forged passports and landed in New York via England and Cuba. According to the biography, Joel said:

“If my grandparents had been found on the train with the documents that said ‘Jew,’ they would have been sent immediately to a concentration camp. They got out. A miracle.”

After Joel’s grandparents landed in New York, his father joined the Army as he was the primary breadwinner of the family. After returning from the war, he married Rosalind Hyman, who came from a family of Jews. She gave birth to Billy on May 9, 1949. They moved to Levittown, Long Island.

According to People magazine, Billy Joel grew up in Long Island, New York, with his mom Rosalind and dad Howard. He has described his father as a “wonderful pianist.” In his docuseries, his sister Judy Molinari claimed that Howard “never really showed Bill kindness and compassion and understanding towards his talent” while taking his piano lessons.

Joel said he was 8 when his parents got divorced, and it was a relief. He said in the documentary:

"When Howard left, it was a relief in that my mother felt more free, but it did give her a lot more stress in that she had to then work very, very hard to keep the family going."

In the documentary, Joel talks about how he tracked down his father after he left the family following the divorce. Time magazine reported that Joel met his father in Vienna in the early 1970s when he was in his 20s. He then met his half-brother Alex, a classical music composer, who also features in the film. He added that Howard joined him on stage at a concert in Nuremberg, Germany, in 1995.

Despite having a tumultuous relationship with his father, Billy said he has forgiven him. Howard passed away in 2011.