One of the more cheering stories of recent weeks has been the reported reconciliation between Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel after years of estrangement.
The pair have had their ups and downs over the years but their friendship seemed over after Garfunkel described Simon as a “jerk” and an “idiot” in an interview with Daily Telegraph in 2015. He later said he regretted that outburst but the damage was done: a decade of silence between the two.
Now in a new interview with NME Art has talked some more about what led up to their recent meeting. It seems that it all stemmed from a chance meeting between Garfunkel and Simon’s son, Harper. “Paul’s ex-wife, Peggy Simon, had moved into the place where I live, and their son ran into me in the halls. I knew this was going to happen sooner or later,” said the singer.
“Harper set up a lunch with Paul and I, and we ended years of estrangement with a lot of sweet candour. Paul said to me, ‘Arty, it’s not that you spoke to the British press and that you didn’t do it well. I know you said you wanted to put spice into the image of Simon and Garfunkel. I know you felt that we were too conservative. Well, my idea of spice meant a certain candour that must have hurt Paul’s feelings. I realised; I did hurt his feelings.”
“He said, ‘I felt you wanted to hurt me. That’s what got me’. And I thought, ‘That’s true’. I wanted to hurt him. The next thing I knew, I burst into tears... then there were hugs. It was a wonderful moment for Simon & Garfunkel. It basically ended the years of detachment.”
Simon & Garfunkel - The Sound of Silence (from The Concert in Central Park)
The interview was conducted together with his son, Art Jr, with whom he has recently released a covers album, Father And Son. “Time is a cherished gift, and it’s not unlimited,” Garfunkel Jr said. “It would be terrible if we didn’t make this album. That was the driving force that led me to approach my father.”
His dad was also asked what was the proudest moment of his long career: “Simon & Garfunkel’s reunion concert in Central Park in 1981,” he said without hesitation.
“Nothing surpassed that. More than half a million people filled up the Great Lawn in Central Park. I came out onstage and said to Paul, ‘I knew we did something right in the 60s, but I didn’t know it was this right’. That was the most glorious of all concerts. The high point of my career.”
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