Simon & Garfunkel’s 1981 Central Park concert was the first timePaul SimonandArt Garfunkelperformed together as Simon & Garfunkel for a full show after the release of their final album,Bridge Over Troubled Water, in 1970. The concert turned out to be a new beginning for the duo — and a new ending.
In part two of the new documentaryIn Restless Dreams: The Music of Paul Simon, which premieres March 24 on MGM+, Simon, 82, recounts the pivotal Central Park show, what it meant for the future of Simon & Garfunkel and the nerve-wracking moment when a man rushed the stage.
He explains that when he was asked to do the concert, he had just faced a hurdle in his career. “Because [his 1980 album]One-Trick Ponywas a flop, when they asked me to do a concert in Central Park, I thought, ‘Well I just had this big flop, maybe I should ask Artie to come and sing some songs on this.'”
Art Garfunkel and Paul Simon performing in Central Park.Nancy Kaye/AP/Shutterstock
What they thought would be a small benefit concert turned into half a million people gathering on the Great Lawn in Central Park to watch the highly anticipated reunion of the former duo, and while it began well, the concert was interrupted.
“The thing that’s interesting about it is like, my band, they’re ready to jump in," Simon adds. “Artie was sitting on the air… he was not taking a bullet for me.”
Simon and Garfunkel Perform in Central Park in 1981.Pictorial Parade / Getty Images
The success of the show led to a brief revival for Simon & Garfunkel. “After the concert in Central Park with Simon & Garfunkel was so big — it was such a big hit — and then that sort of forced us into… forced me into putting the group back together again and doing a tour,” Simon recalls.
The “Kodachrome” singer says he decided to forget his past grievances with Garfunkel, 82. “We were famously antagonistic, but I thought, ‘You know what? I am going to put that all aside and have a good reunited tour with Artie.'”
Simon adds that the tour ended up being “a hit,” and the pair discussed reuniting for good. “We said — the album I was working on,Hearts and Bones— that’ll be a Simon & Garfunkel record."
Things changed, however, when Simon realized how different Garfunkel’s involvement was this time around.
“It was a recapitulation of he’s in Mexico making a movie. Well, now he wanted to smoke and walk through Switzerland and make up harmonies to these songs and then he would send them back and we would look at it and say, ‘What is this?’ It didn’t sound like the old Simon & Garfunkel. And I just said, ‘I can’t work this way.'”
Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel.Columbia Records/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty
Simon explains that he knew saying no to Garfunkel meant the new album would not be as successful, but it was a sacrifice he was willing to make. “I decided I’m not gonna do it, so I had to make an announcement: ‘Hearts and Bones, it’s not gonna be a Simon & Garfunkel album.’ Everybody was disappointed. So that record was kind of cursed before it really got off the ground.”
While the Central Park concert appeared to be a turning point for Simon & Garfunkel, in reality, Simon says, it was just “a luxurious bandage.”
“The breakup that happened after [Garfunkel’s 1970 film]Catch-22was never repaired,” he explains. “It was just a bandage put over it. But the bandage was such a luxurious bandage — the concert in Central Park — we forgot that essentially, we were done as a team.”
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Part one ofIn Restless Dreams: The Music of Paul Simonis available to stream on MGM+.
source: people.com
