Art Garfunkel has urged estranged partner and childhood friend Paul Simon to get in touch with him. The pair has been at odds in recent years, with Simon choosing to carry on as a solo performer, resulting in Garfunkel lobbing some pretty fierce and very public jabs at Simon.
During a chat with American Songwriter, Garfunkel was praised at earning a standing ovation every time he sings the Simon-written Simon & Garfunkel masterpiece, “Bridge Over Troubled Water.” Garfunkel explained, “Paul’s just a great writer, and when his great writing happens for me in my heart and mind, I deliver the exciting song. A good singer, that would be me, makes a powerful song. I started thinking of what Paul was really talking about. It’s very sad that we don’t talk, too. Some of his lines kill me. In 'The Sound Of Silence,' the fourth verse: 'Silence like a cancer grows.' We never speak these days, Paul and I. And yet he wrote, 'Silence like a cancer grows.' It’s sad how true it was years later. 'Bridge Over Troubled Water' has these things: I’ll be your friend when you’re in trouble. Well, I’m in trouble now that I’m 78, Paul. If Paul is supposed to be my friend, give me a phone call, Paul. Read this American Songwriter interview and give me a phone call. . . It’s been a while.”
Garfunkel was asked what he remembered 45 years on about Simon & Garfunkel's initial reunion track — the 1975 Top 10 hit “My Little Town”: “Well, it was surprisingly black. I remember it as black. I felt that this one’s not going to be melodic at all. I know they love Simon & Garfunkel’s sweet tooth. We could be funky and pretty in a surprising way that’s quite witty when we want to be, and we use it a lot. But here’s one that hardly has any of that. It’s done very sparingly. And then it gets real pretty. It’s sweet stuff in a careful way that fits the lyric. It’s bitter. It’s about how unimaginative they were, where I come from. Now you know my friend Paul. He’s had an angry side of how unimaginative they were, those people where I come from.”
