Billy Joel dismisses tour cancellation reports

Billy Joel recently told Rolling Stone that he did not pull the plug on a summer tour with Elton John, contrary to reports that stemmed from a Chicago Tribune article. He said he never planned to tour this year and there were no confirmed bookings for the duo's Face to Face outing.

Joel told RS that rumors about a 2010 summer tour were apparently leaked by insiders at venues where booking agents had inquired about available dates for a possible Joel/John show. "Booking agents hold real estate," Joel said. "They like to research what's available when, to see if they can put together a series of dates. Then they'll come back to the artist and say, 'Look, if you wanted to, you could play such and such and such.'"

According to Joel, at the time of the Chicago interview, John had just found out from his booking agent that his tour mate wasn't going to be working this summer. The Piano Man said when he approached John about his comments, the flamboyant performer confirmed he had just found out Joel wasn't going to be working in 2010 and expressed his disappointment to the media.

Joel insisted there is no bad blood between him and John and said the successful Face to Face tour would probably pick up again in the future. However, he did not say when.

The duo is currently performing several Face to Face concerts; however the dates, which run until March 11, are make-up dates for concerts that were canceled last year.