Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel became good friends after first meeting at elementary school in New York City, and grew into one of the most popular songwriting duos in the world. Though their friendship would be rocky over the intervening years, their partnership was artistically fruitful, yielding a clutch of classic albums and songs such as "Mrs. Robinson" and "Bridge Over Troubled Water".
Paul and Art formed the group Tom and Jerry in 1957 and had success with the hit single "Hey, Schoolgirl", but subsequent singles failed to achieve much. After high school they both went to separate colleges. In 1963 they independently discovered an interest in the emerging folk scene and when they met up again they recorded Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. (1964). Unfortunately, it was not an immediate success and in 1965 the pair broke up, with Simon moving to England to pursue a solo career. Later that year, a track from the album, "The Sounds of Silence", began to gain popularity, finally reaching the No.1 spot in 1966. This prompted Simon's return to the States to record a series of successful albums in the 1960s starting with 1966's Sounds Of Silence. The soundtrack to The Graduate (1968) resulted in a Grammy for "Mrs. Robinson".
However, the relationship between the two was beginning to fracture and after their hugely successful and seminal final album, Bridge Over Troubled Water (1970), they went their separate ways.
From Wikipedia
Reunions from Wikipedia
Simon and Garfunkel's first reunion after their second breakup was at a June 1972 benefit concert at Madison Square Garden for presidential candidate George McGovern.
On October 18, 1975, the duo made an appearance on the second episode of NBC's new show Saturday Night Live. They performed "The Boxer", "Scarborough Fair", and "My Little Town". The last song was the only new Simon and Garfunkel recording in five years, appearing on both men's solo albums released in 1975 (Simon's Still Crazy After All These Years and Garfunkel's Breakaway) and reaching #9 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart.
Simon, along with James Taylor, provided harmony vocals on Garfunkel's cover of Sam Cooke's "Wonderful World", on Garfunkel's 1977 album Watermark; the single release of that song reached #1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart and #17 on the Hot 100. Simon also contributed backing vocals to "In Cars", a song on Garfunkel's 1981 solo album Scissors Cut.
Simon and Garfunkel reunited again for a free concert in New York City's Central Park on September 19, 1981. The concert was attended by over 500,000 people, and a recording of it was subsequently released as a live album, with their cover of "Wake Up Little Susie" released as a single. A video recording was likewise televised by HBO and issued on home video. The success of the Central Park concert prompted the duo to go on a world tour in 1982–1983, including a performance at Shea Stadium in August, 1983.
Simon and Garfunkel went on to complete the recording of their first new studio album in more than a decade, provisionally titled Think Too Much and featuring some songs previewed on their recent concert jaunt. However, creative differences, coupled with the record company's negative reaction to the decidedly un-Simon-and-Garfunkel-like album, led Simon to remove Garfunkel's vocal tracks and rework the songs himself. The 1983 Simon solo album Hearts and Bones was the result, and a long period of estrangement for the duo followed.
Their next joint public appearance was in 1990, when the two performed at a ceremony for their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Simon and Garfunkel appeared together in 1993 for 21 sold out concerts in New York, with half of the show being Paul Simon solo with a band and the other half Simon and Garfunkel. Later the same year, they did some charity concerts, including the Bridge School Benefit concerts and a benefit for United Way Children's Charities at SkyDome in Toronto.
In July 2002, Columbia Legacy issued a previously unreleased live recording of a Simon and Garfunkel concert, Live from New York City, 1967. It features an almost-complete recording of a performance given by the duo at Philharmonic Hall, at Lincoln Center in New York City on January 22, 1967. The album includes a rendition of "A Church Is Burning", one of the songs that originally appeared on Paul Simon's 1965 solo album, The Paul Simon Songbook.
On February 23, 2003, Simon and Garfunkel reunited to perform in public for the first time in a decade, singing "The Sound of Silence" as the opening act of the Grammy Awards. Before the show, the duo was presented with the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, honoring their musical contributions over the past four and a half decades. They were introduced by Dustin Hoffman, who made his debut in the film The Graduate, which extensively featured their music.
The good feelings generated by their appearance on the Grammys led to another thaw in their relationship. Soon, Simon and Garfunkel launched a two-month long reunion tour of the United States (and Toronto, Canada), which began October 16 and culminated in Tampa on December 21, 2003.
Entitled Old Friends, their first tour in over twenty years included forty shows in twenty-eight cities and featured special guests The Everly Brothers. The tour featured in its opening video montage a short series of clips and photos taken during the day leading up to the concert around the venue. Simon and Garfunkel performed "Hey, Schoolgirl", which they said was the first song they had written and recorded together. At the tour concert at Continental Airlines Arena in East Rutherford, NJ, they performed "Leaves That Are Green" in place of "Song for the Asking", which had been on their set list for the other concerts on this tour, following an announcement that they had not played it in concert since 1967. They also played "Leaves That Are Green" at concerts in Boston after making a similar announcement.
The success of the first Old Friends tour led to an encore in June and July 2004 with over 25 shows, this time also in Europe. In July 2004, they completed the tour with a flourish, with a finale at the Colosseum in Rome before an audience which, according to the Mayor of Rome, exceeded 600,000 — even larger than the audience at the famous 1981 Central Park concert.
A live CD and DVD from their Old Friends tour was released in late 2004. It featured a "new" studio duo song, "Citizen of the Planet", one of the songs from the rejected 1983 reunion album that did not originally feature Garfunkel's vocal participation.
In 2007, PBS hosted the first Gershwin Awards, at which Paul Simon was honored. Simon introduced Garfunkel (for a cameo appearance) as "my partner in arguments" and the two sang "Bridge over Troubled Water" together.
Columbia/Legacy announced the September 18, 2007, release of Live 1969, which was said to feature recently discovered masters recorded on their 1969 tour. The album is now available through Starbucks. Most of the arrangements remain virtually unchanged.
That 1969 tour would be their last for over a decade, immediately preceding the release of the 1970 album Bridge Over Troubled Water. The tour was recorded preparing for a subsequent live album, but the release of the live album did not happen, until now, as reported in Billboard.
On February 13, 2009, Simon and his band re-opened New York's legendary Beacon Theatre, which had been closed for seven months for a renovation. As an encore, Simon brought out "[his] old friend" Art Garfunkel. They sang 3 songs: "Sound of Silence", "The Boxer", and "Old Friends".
On April 2, 2009, the duo announced a tour of Australia, New Zealand and Japan for June/July 2009. ] On October 29–30, they participated together in the 25th anniversary of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame concerts at New York's Madison Square Garden. Other artists on the bill included Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band; U2; Metallica; Aretha Franklin; Stevie Wonder, and Crosby, Stills & Nash
In March 2010, Simon & Garfunkel announced a 13-date spring tour, to kick off in April with a performance at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Most performances were scheduled for Canada, with four shows in the upper Midwest of the U.S. According to a press release, the set list would focus on their classic catalog, as well as songs from each of their solo careers. On June 17, 2010, Simon & Garfunkel canceled the tour, earlier rescheduled for July 2010, now postponed indefinitely as Garfunkel continues to recover from a vocal cord paresis.
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