In 1962, a 15-year-old boy named Reginald Dwight landed a job playing piano at a neighborhood pub in Northwood Hills, England. Four nights a week, from Thursday through Sunday, he entertained customers with popular songs and familiar standards, gaining experience that would eventually help turn him into one of the biggest stars in music history.
That teenager was Elton John, and 61 years later, he would conclude his extraordinary touring career with a farewell concert in Stockholm, Sweden, after a tour that grossed an astonishing $939.1 million.
“While I was in school I was playing in a pub every Friday, Saturday and Sunday night for a year,” John told Rolling Stone in 1973. “This was all to earn money to buy electric pianos and mikes and amplifiers and things. I used to make a quid a night but then I’d take my box around and people would put donations in it. For my age, I was making a fortune, getting about 35 quid a week, I think.”
The journey from a local pub to sold-out stadiums around the world was decades in the making.
John had demonstrated musical talent from an early age, learning to play piano as a child and winning a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music in London when he was just 11. But it was his regular performances at the Northwood Hills Hotel, a pub near his family’s home, that gave him some of his earliest experience playing for paying audiences. Performing under his birth name, he developed a repertoire that included songs by artists such as Jim Reeves and Ray Charles, along with popular tunes of the day.
The experience helped prepare him for a professional career.
In the mid-1960s, he joined the band Bluesology, eventually adopting the stage name Elton John. His fortunes changed dramatically in 1967 when he met lyricist Bernie Taupin, beginning one of popular music’s most successful songwriting partnerships. Together, they created an extraordinary catalog of hits, including “Your Song,” “Rocket Man,” “Tiny Dancer,” “Crocodile Rock,” and “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.”
“You have to understand, I was flying by the seat of my pants,” Taupin told Entertainment Weekly of his early days working with John. “I had no idea how to write a song. I was just trying to get out of my rut in the north of England, because I left school at 15 and wasn’t qualified for anything beyond manual labour. I still wake up and think, I dodged a bullet there.”
By the 1970s, John had become an international superstar, famous for his flamboyant costumes, elaborate glasses, and electrifying live performances. Over the following decades, he sold more than 300 million records worldwide and became one of the most successful touring artists in history.
In 2018, John announced his Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour, a massive international production intended to bring his decades of touring to a close. The tour began in September 2018 in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and stretched across five years, with interruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and health-related postponements.
Its final performance took place on July 8, 2023, at the Tele2 Arena in Stockholm, where John delivered an emotional farewell to fans. By the time the tour concluded, it had grossed $939.1 million, becoming the highest-grossing concert tour ever recorded at that time.
For John, the milestone represented an extraordinary conclusion to a career that had begun with a teenage piano job in a small English pub.
“I’m 77 years of age,” John said in 2024. “I’ve done all there is to do. I’ve succeeded. I’ve been there. I’ve done it. I’m still going to make records. I’m still going to have music in my life. But the most important thing in my life [is husband] David, [adolescent sons] Zachary and Elijah, and my family and my friends.”
What started with four nights a week entertaining local customers ultimately became a musical legacy spanning six decades, countless hits, and nearly a billion dollars in farewell tour revenue.
Related: In 1973, KISS earned $50 playing its first show to fewer than 10 people in Queens; 51 years later, the band sold its songs and name for over $300 million
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