Accomplished music video director Jon Small, who played drums in Billy Joel‘s early bands the Hassles and Atilla, has died.
Joel announced his passing in a brief Instagram post, captioned: “RIP Jon Lord.” His funeral will be held on Wednesday (September 9) in Great Neck, New York, and at the time of writing, no cause of death has been given.
Getting their start together as teenagers in New York, Small and Joel first teamed up in the 1960s as members of the Hassles. The group released two albums in the late ’60s before Joel and Small departed to form the hard rock duo Attila, whose sole self-titled album came out in 1970.
Attila dissolved the following year when Joel began an affair with Small’s wife, Elizabeth Weber, a subject that all those involved discussed at length in the HBO documentary Billy Joel: And So It Goes.
RIP Jon Small, Drummer
The Hassles, Atilla w/ Billy Joel
Music Video Producer:
“Tell Her About It”
“Piano Man”
Run D.M.C./Aerosmith’s “Walk the Way”
Collaborated w/ Whitney Houston, Sting, Meatloaf, Taylor Swift
Long Island Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame#InMemoriam #RIP pic.twitter.com/YRhZ71Y5ee— LegacyTributes (@InMemoriamX) September 7, 2026
“Elizabeth was very important to me, but I think I was not the guy she hoped I would be,” Small said in the 2025 documentary. “I kept seeing that Billy was not the same guy. Something was the matter.
“And Billy one day came up to me, became a little honest, and said to me, ‘I’m in love with your wife.’ So it was a very devastating thing for me, because these were basically my two best friends.”
Joel added that he felt “very, very guilty about it”, saying: “They had a child. I felt like a homewrecker. I was just in love with a woman, and I got punched in the nose, which I deserved. Jon was very upset. I was very upset.”
In the doc, Joel revealed that he felt such guilt over betraying Small that he attempted suicide by drinking furniture polish, but Small rescued him by driving him to the hospital. The ordeal later became the basis for ‘Tomorrow Is Today’ from Joel’s solo debut, 1971’s ‘Cold Spring Harbor’.
Joel and Weber eventually reunited and wed, in a marriage that lasted from 1973 to 1982. Small and Joel also eventually reconciled, working on several music videos together, including ‘Uptown Girl’, ‘Keeping the Faith’ and ‘Tell Her About It’.
In a tribute shared by a friend of Small’s on Facebook, it was noted that his “behind-the-camera impact on popular music goes far beyond just one artist”. As one of the first music video directors and producers of the MTV era, he helped define the format with now famous videos for the likes of Whitney Houston, Kenny Rogers, Garth Brooks, Reba McEntire, Run-DMC and Aerosmith.
Small was nominated for a Grammy in the ’90s for his work on Joel’s Live at Yankee Stadium film, and much of his later career was spent focusing on concert films.
