NP but Paul Simon on Writing Songs

[Allan Balliett]

I to recommend that recently released Art Garfunkel autobiography "What is
it All but Luminous" a while back.  I don't remember any takers at the
time.

In the meantime, I've come to enjoy the book even more than I did earlier.
What had eluded me at the first was the 'feel' of the writing. Reading it,
autobiography that it was, the narrative would become unstuck in time and
in perspective and it would merge just about curiosity of interest to
bohemian taste in a way very much like some of Ginsberg's bettr poetry but
with a freer, 'more luminous' feel. LIttle wonder, it turns out that this
book is a collection of notebook scraps he wrote down most evenings during
a 1983 walk across America.

On the Road Indeed.

The guy is loves books. It's crazy the way he talks about books, the way he
plans for trael by deciding how many inches of pages he should bring with
him. It seems he likes to read the seldom mentioned works of well known
writers. He apparently has rooms filled with books in his appartment, or
did I mean to say he has a 3 floor appartment and one floor is THE LIBRARY?

WIsh I had been born with the Gift of a Golden Voice and could have
dedicated so much time to reading.

Anyway, good fun invasive interview with Arty in Today's Rolling Stone
newsletter (below)


*Art Garfunkel on His Unusual New Book, the End of Simon and Garfunkel:* The
singer explains how he wrote 'What Is It All But Luminous' and why he
doesn't expect to sing with Paul Simon ever again


In the spring of 1983, Art Garfunkel
<http://www.rollingstone.com/music/artists/art-garfunkel>stepped out of his
New York apartment building and began a walk across North America. The
journey was conducted across 40 installments (always picking up exactly
where the last one ended) and took him 14 years to complete. The whole
time, he had a small notepad and pen in his back pocket. "I'd stay at
two-star inns during the night," he says. "And when inspiration struck me,
I'd write little bits. There must have been a thousand of them." Those bits
included poems, lists, scattered thoughts and pointed anecdotes from his
long career. He never gave much thought to publishing them until he showed
them to literary agent Dan Strone a few years back. "He said, 'You have a
book here,'" recalls Garfunkel. "I then shaped them chronologically and
said, 'It's my life.'"


The end result is *What Is It All But Luminous: Notes From an Underground
Man*
<https://www.amazon.com/What-All-but-Luminous-Underground/dp/0385352476>,
which is unlike any book ever released by a rock star. There are segments
about the formation and ultimate bitter dissolution of Simon and Garfunkel,
along with other passages about his long life, but they are mixed in with
lists of books he's read and songs on his iPod, quotes from the likes of
Shakespeare and Marvin Gaye, and set lists from his concerts. There are
also numerous poems, including one about getting a colonic by a woman from
Queens. ("After the evacuation behind the bathroom door, I mention the
clickety sound of colonics, so she tap dances on the hardwood floor.")

Right now, Garfunkel is perched on a chaise lounge on the roof of a luxury
New York apartment building overlooking a picturesque, panoramic view of
the skyline. He just returned from a U.S. book tour and he's resting up
before flying off to Japan for a series of solo dates. A grey, floppy hat
rests on his head, a packet of Lifesavers peeks out of his front pocket,
and in his hand is his book. Over the next hour, he happily fielded any
question *Rolling Stone* threw his way, though, unsurprisingly, he didn't
feel like sharing why he's no longer on speaking terms with Paul Simon.

I read about the fire at your apartment
<http://nypost.com/2015/02/19/art-garfunkels-nyc-penthouse-catches-fire/> a
couple years back. Are you living here now?
For now. [The smoke damage] led to a major fixing up of our place. My wife
took over and I stepped back, so I've been living here. It's been two
years, but very shortly I get to move back in.

How bad was the damage?
Not so bad. We have three floors. The top floor is a library. I like to be
up there to make my phones calls and do my writing. I love my books. I have
1,165 of them spread around the walls.
<http://www.artgarfunkel.com/library/list1.html> Every one I read. I

n order. They're good books. It's Darwin, *Origin of the Species*, the good
stuff. They are all there. Well, I lost one of the walls in the fire. There
went a hundred of them. So I replaced them. Every damn one of them.

I've always been fascinated by your perfect handwriting. Did you write the
whole book out by hand?
Yeah. When I was 11, Paul Simon, my fast friend, would say to people, "Look
at my friend Artie, he's the human typewriter." It was sweet. But I hate to
disappoint you, though I did write the whole book top to bottom with my
left hand. And then Vicky Wilson, my great editor at Knopf, said to me,
"Here's what I want you to do. Give me your perfect A, B, C, D ... and we
will digitize that and we will have the ability to manipulate [and turn it
into a font for the book.]"

Did you read books by other musicians while preparing for this one?
Well, there's the famous Keith Richards book and the Clapton one. These
books are giant sellers. I did not read either of them. I don't put myself
into the category of "rock star writing his biography." That's because we
live our lives by falling into experiences. Things happen to us. Something
you do takes hold of you and then you do a lot of it. And it has a name.
And then it wraps itself around you and then an interviewer asks you, "When
did you start this endeavor?"

Did you ever think about writing a traditional memoir without the poetry
and lists and everything?
Well, you're starting from the starting point as if a person begins with a
desk and a clean piece of paper. But your premise is wrong. We don't start
with any beginning. We never know what we're doing. We fall into it. I fell
into these scraps of paper and I was told, "You may have a book here." I
started shaping it up. Dan Strone shopped it around. I fell into the
experience. I knew it was different from other things. I'm always
different. I'm an eccentric man.

There's a bunch of books about Simon and Garfunkel. Have you read any of
them?
I read one many years ago. What can I say? It didn't capture ... I think
the main thing about us is that we're good. We're very good. We take two
very different people, Artie and Paul, who have very different natures and
found a fusion. It's a cute trick.

You wrote in the book that your friendship with Paul was "shattered" in
1958 when he made a solo deal behind your back.
[*Puts up his hands like a boxer*] Now, watch out for Andy. He's going to
come in on you now. It's what Muhammad Ali did.

"Shattered" is a pretty strong statement. You guys were just kids when that
happened.
So you read my book properly. It's a strong statement. Ask me your precise
question, Mr. Greene.

I was just taken aback that you felt things were shattered that early. Did
everything feel differently after that?
Yes.

Hmmm ...
Notice that I'm not helping you much.

That's OK.
But yes, it's a very strong statement. You were wise to pick up on it and
go, "Well, that upsets the whole Simon and Garfunkel thing." I'm not going
to fight that.

So how did you maintain your friendship with him during the Simon and
Garfunkel days in the Sixties if you felt he shattered it before it even
started?
You mean I should be a perfectionist and hope that friendships have no
blemishes? Isn't that compulsively ... isn't that too perfectionist?
Everything has blemishes. I'm fooling around now with the answer. I'm
saying, "Well, of course there's stains. There's stains in everything." We
try and accept them and carry on. It's a mixed bag. You're talking about a
man who's a tremendous talent. It's a real turn-on to sit in the same room
and make music with a tremendous talent.

I spoke to him about a year and a half ago.
<http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/paul-simon-talks-upcoming-tour-end-of-simon-and-garfunkel-20160419>
He
told me you guys were no longer on speaking terms.

[*Stares into my eyes and doesn't respond*]

May I ask what happened?
I don't think you can because there are things that are personal and deep
between us, instead of the Internet, your readers. ...

That's fair.
Good. I'm glad you see that.

In 2015 you called him a "jerk" and said that you "created a monster"
<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/rockandpopmusic/11626027/art-garfunkel-interview-paul-simon.html>
by
becoming his friend in the first place. Do you regret saying all that?
Yes. I do. [*Smiling*] You press people, you get stuff out of us. You're
going to come with one any minute. You're going to find me relaxing and
you're going to come with the left hook.

Are you hopeful you two will patch things up and maybe sing together again
one day?
Not particularly.

Why?
Now, the word "enough" just flew into my mind. ...

OK. I'll move on. I know I was pushing my luck there. How is your solo tour
going now? I know that you've been back on the road now for a few years.
I love my show. I lost my voice in 2010. That's seven years ago. Tragic. I
had come off an arena tour with Pauly – [*whispers*] he goes, "Pauly? That
sounds pretty friendly with me. They're not that angry with each other.
..." – in the Far East. When I got home a month later my voice went south.
I couldn't speak. I couldn't sing. It was all froggy. When I saw the
doctor, he said, "Yeah, the camera shows one of your two vocal cords is fat
and stiff." That's what it felt like. But I was determined to not accept
it's gone. I don't know how to be an Art Garfunkel that doesn't sing. I was
dedicated to my own recovery. And it took years. I would book a hall that
was empty and sing to an empty hall.

It was terrible. 2012, no voice. I would fall to my knees and look up at
God and say, "Oh, man, this is tough. I don't know how to be a person." And
finally I would sing some shows where the voice crapped out. There were
people in the audience. I did my best. I saw that there was lots of love
and support. Here's the insider [tip]: If you pretend that you are
recovered and go onstage and do your best and take the bravery of being a
little crappy, but also a little there, you pull your recovery along. And
by 2014 I was singing again and I was grateful to God.

You have some tough songs to sing. The climax of "Bridge Over Troubled
Water" would be tough for anybody.
I don't do [sings] "Like a bridge. ..." You went right to the one part of
my recovery I haven't gotten to. [Sings again] "Like a bridge ..."

That's just one little moment of one song.
One. The other 99.9 percent is there, but I rewrote the end of "Bridge."
It's beautiful. Once my voice came back, I designed a "less is more" show."
I called my friend Tab Laven. He's been my brother all the way through.
He's been playing Paul Simon. Not easy to do. We do half Simon and
Garfunkel, because it would be coy to turn my back on it. And we do songs
from my 12 solo albums. In the past year, we've picked up Dave Mackay,
fabulous piano player. Boy, this is an exciting thing for me. Now we have
piano in a whole bunch of songs. I'm captivated by my new show. I love it
so much.

A lot of people lose their voice and never recover it. You must be so
grateful.
You bet. I finish my show with a little prayer. "Now I lay me down to
sleep, I pay the Lord my soul to keep. God will save me." When I was five I
realized I had a singing voice. It was pretty. It delighted me. So it's a
great gift in my throat. When you have a gift, you think about the giver.
Who gave this to me? And this takes you to a spiritual sense of God. That
has captivated me all through my life, serving that lucky gift.

Not a lot of people that were singing professionally in 1956 are still out
there doing it.
I was a weird kid, a special kid.

It's a shame there's no film of you guys in the Tom and Jerry days. I'd
love to see you on *American Bandstand*.
I would love to see Dick Clark ask Paul Simon where he was from. He said,
"Macon, Georgia." I would love to see my face.

It's insane you had to go on after Jerry Lee Lewis singing "Great Balls of
Fire." It's like a scene in a movie or something.
Yeah. It was great. I was a fan of *American Bandstand*. I would come home
from school and watch those dancing kids.

Then you were on it.
My life spun around. It's because at age five I realized I could sing good.
Then at age 11 I met this guy, Paul Simon. We fused our talents. Never
forget this: Allen Freed brought this new, subversive music to New York in
1954. And we were 12, 13, a great age to be impressionable. Same as John
Lennon, Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan. This is our age group. Rock & Roll, that
was Alan Freed's phrase, was born in the Western world.

It's always amazed me that so many of you guys were born in this tiny
window of time in the early 1940s. A few years earlier you would have been
too old when rock hit. Before that, you would have been fighting in World
War II. You had perfect timing.
America was sitting pretty. We won World War II. We were rich. We were
benevolent. We were charitable, the Marshall Plan. As God gave me a singing
voice, America gave the Western world the means to get back on their feet.
That's why I look at today as such a tough time.

I like to think it's temporary. It's a bad chapter that will end in a few
years, if not sooner.
So we're not falling off a cliff together? That's the theory and its so
tempting.

I think we have to view it as a few big steps backwards, but progress will
continue.
Yes. We must think that

On Fri, Sep 29, 2017 at 6:43 AM, Allan Balliett <allan.balliett at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Today's selection from delancyplace.com (for the younger set, you can
> subscribe by texting "nonfiction" to 22828),  an excerpt service I've
> subscribed to for years that occasionally sends just the right clipping at
> just the right time. You can pick up their sensibility to what I think of
> as "My Generation" in their short intro to this one:  " -- from The 60s,
> "Simon & Garfunkel" by James Stevenson. A 1967 conversation with Paul
> Simon, who wrote such hits as "The Sound of Silence," "Mrs. Robinson," and
> "Bridge Over Troubled Water," about songwriting"
>
> To which I add "How terribly strange to be seventy…"
>
> There's a cute piece somewhere, in an interview with Paul Simon about
> hanging out with Paul McCartney at around an SNL appearance long ago. where
> Paul Simon asks the other Paul if it's true that  he writes a song in a few
> minutes. McCartney offered to show him it was true and asked for a copy of
> that day's NYTimes, a tool he said he often used to pick a topic for a
> song. Picasso had just died and his last words were quoted. McCartney wrote
> the song in front of Simon in a taxi cab I believe "Drink to me, Drink to
> my Health.."  There is a similar conversation recorded between Dylan (the
> thin wild Mercury style) and Leonard Cohen (the living for years with a
> song, literally filling notebooks with ideas for it).
>
> My favorite quote from Simon on songwriting preceded the comments below.
> He said "People say I'm a poet. Well, if you think my songs are poetry I
> feel sorry for you because you've never read poetry." (I paraphrase, I'm
> certain.)
>
> I recently listened to the remastered Simon and Garfunkel albums, each one
> turned out to be  so much better than I remembered, having not listened to
> any of them since 1973. Garfunkel's autobiography came out a couple of
> weeks ago. Good he got that out of the way but, man, what an awkward
> writer! I haven't read it yet, I do hope he's been comfortable for these
> last many years after acting in "Catch 22" cost him his musical career.
>
> "Writing is often an excruciating process. I've been work­ing on one song
> for three months now. In the past, I could go faster, but I wouldn't accept
> those songs now. Now I say, 'No. It's got to be framed right,' and I spend
> months. Every time I pick up the guitar, I start on the song. When I go to
> sleep, I spend half an hour thinking about it. Songs get stagnant, and they
> turn on me. Lines that were good you begin to discard. I use the guitar. I
> grab a chord, and then I'm into something. My early songs were derivative.
> I was influenced by so many people. Elvis Presley in­fluenced me to play
> the guitar; the Everly Brothers influenced our singing; Bob Dylan ...
> Later, these merge with your personality. I use less imagery now, less
> metaphor. I give you the picture, stretch it, and let you feel it. When
> your mind is about to turn off, I try and get a word or a line that's
> different, so you snap back. If I lose the guy, I don't get him back. I
> want to make the words rich and yet plain -- tasteful without being prissy
> or too delicate. One word can throw it off. It's not poetry. I'm writing
> sounds that must be sung, and heard sung. I'm conscious of the medium I'm
> working in.
>
> "What should be said in a song? What would be better said in an essay? A
> song is an impression when it's heard only once. Of course, sometimes I
> make a song purely an impression, like 'Feelin' Groovy.' I think: Yellow
> ... pink ... blue ... bubbles ... gurgle ... happy. The line 'I'm dappled
> and drowsy' -- it doesn't make sense. I just felt dappled. Sleepy,
> con­tented. The song only runs one minute and twenty-nine seconds, with a
> long fadeout. When you've made your impression, stop. I don't want the
> audience to have time to think. It's a happy song, and that's what it was.
> There's the other kind of song, like 'The Dangling Conversation.' It's
> intricately worked out. Every word is picked on purpose. Maybe it's
> English-major stuff, but if you haven't caught the symbolism, you haven't
> missed anything, really. You've got to keep people moving. The attention
> span is very limited. People don't listen carefully. Unless you jolt 'em,
> it's going to be down the drain. You've got to get the right mixture of
> sound and words. I write about the things I know and observe.
>
> "I can look into people and see scars in them. These are the people I grew
> up with. For the most part, older people. These people are sensitive, and
> there's a desperate quality to them -- everything is beating them down, and
> they become more aware of it as they become older. I get a sense they're
> thirty-three, with an aware­ness that 'Here I am thirty-three!' and they
> probably spend a lot of afternoons wondering how they got there so fast.
> They're edu­cated, but they're losing, very gradually. Not realizing,
> except for just an occasional glimpse. They're successful, but not happy,
> and I feel that pain. They've got me hooked because they are people in
> pain. I'm drawn to these people, and driven to write about them. In this
> country, it's painful for people to grow old. When sexual attractiveness is
> focussed on a seventeen-year-old girl, you must feel it slipping away if
> you're a thirty-three-year-old woman. So you say, 'I'm going to stop
> smoking. I'm going to get a suntan. I'm going on a diet. I'm going to play
> tennis.' What's intriguing is that they are just not quite in control of
> their destiny. Nobody is paying any attention to these people, because
> they're not crying very loud."
>
>
>
> The 60s: The Story of a Decade
> Editor: Henry Finder
> Publisher: Random House
> Copyright 2016 by The New Yorker Magazine
> Pages 386-387
>
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