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Summary.
Paul Simon
was the poet who best captured the psyche of his generation.
While Dylan was the spokesman of the peace marches and the campus sit-ins,
Simon represented the average, shy, introverted kid, lonely in his bedroom,
distressed by post-puberal sensitivity.
Simon did not write angry protest songs, but tender, fragile, ethereal,
melancholy odes, notably
The Sounds Of Silence (1965),
I Am A Rock (1966),
Mrs Robinson (1968),
Bridge Over Troubled Water (1969),
The Boxer (1969).
He employed the simplest and most recognizible of vehicles: vocal harmonies
and the folk ballad. He fused them in an austere structure that had the
magnificent translucence of the madrigal and the motet.
On his own, Paul Simon (after breaking up with Art Garfunkel) shifted the
emphasis on ethnic music, achieving a sublime fusion of western and African
traditions on There Goes Rhymin' Simon (1973),
Heart And Bones (1983), and Graceland (1986).
(Translated by Ornella C. Grannis)
Paul Simon was the Greenwich Movement poet who better than any other
captured the psyche of his generation. Removed from the peace marches
and the campus sit-ins, Simon used music to express the sensibility of
those who were more emotional and introverted. His songs are tender
responses and seem fragile compared to the songs of protest. The autumnal
tone of Simon & Garfunkel was the opposite of Dylan's angry and prophetic
tone. The students protested in the campuses but at the end of the day
they had to contend with the subjective conundrum of post-puberty.
Musically Simon & Garfunkel joined the two white traditions that endured
after the war: that of folk singers and that of vocal harmonies. With
respect to the folk tradition, Simon & Garfunkel were sweeter and more
melodic, closer to the English and Scottish masters. With respect to the
vocal harmonies, the duo displayed a clearer and more austere style,
almost neoclassical, influenced by renaissance music and medieval motets. Their
most immediate influence was the Everly Brothers, but Simon's whispering,
almost in falsetto and Art Garfunkel's seraphim harmonizing produced
something much more ethereal, even spiritual.
Simon and Garfunkel, neighborhood friends, debuted at 15 in 1957 with
the pseudonym Tom and Jerry. They had a small hit, Hey Schoolgirl. They
split for several years, during which time Garfunkel studied architecture
and Simon made a living selling lyrics. They found each other again in
1962 and in 1964 got a recording contract. They recorded Wednesday Morning
3 AM (Columbia, 1964), a compilation of covers and originals performed only
with an acoustic guitar; unfortunately they were considered two more
imitators of Dylan.
Thanks to their producer, Tom Wilson, one of the few Afro-American producers,
the same man who had "electrified" Dylan,
one of their songs bounced to the top of the charts. Wilson had complemented
the original acoustic sound with an arrangement of electric guitars, bass
and drums
(Hal Blaine on drums, Larry Knechtel on keyboards, Joe Osborn on bass guitar, and three guitarists including Joe South).
Thus regenerated, The Sound Of Silence - a denunciation of
incommunicability - became the most moving single of 1965. The lyric was
an emotional shock for a generation of adolescents violated by the lack of
feeling in urban civilization and more than ever needing love: "And the
people bowed and prayed/ to the neon god they made/ and the sign flashed out
its warning/ ...The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls/
and tenement halls/ and whispered in the sound of silence". Simon, who was
in England recording Song Book (CBS, 1965), knew nothing of the new
arrangement. When he returned, he discovered that he had become famous.
Simon learned his lesson and from that moment on he applied the same
procedure to all the songs he composed. In effect the majority of their
successive hits were songs that he had originally composed prior to 1965
(or for his English album). In the span of few months Kathy's Song (1965),
an idyllic guitar serenade and I Am A Rock (1966), influenced by the sound
of Blonde On Blonde, reached the top of the charts.
Simon specialized in tender inspections into the soul of adolescents and
also in picturesque miniatures of Americana arranged in a simple manner
and sung in muted tones by the two singers. Their music, always at the
boundary between fresh graceful poetry and careless pop tune, resorted
to images and emotions - whereas Dylan resorted to visions and sermons -
to express the malaise of youth.
The idea came at the right moment: their sound, easy and light, satisfied
the detachment of the conformists and the existential melancholy of the
protesters.
The Sounds Of Silence (Columbia, 1966) contains the hit and part of the
material of Song Book, songs written from 1962 to 1965.
Parsley Sage Rosemary And Thyme (Columbia, 1966), still with Hal Blaine on drums and Joe South on guitar,
is the first album to show
an artistic personality. Scarborough Fair opens the album with its delicate
interlacing of vocalizations over a humble, tinkling accompaniment by
harpsichord, triangles and guitar (a masterpiece of production, due to the
first eight-track recorder). For Emily, a simple experiment with
brilliant rhythms, gives free play to Simon's romanticism. Homeward Bound
fuses pop music with the country of the prairies. Dangling Conversation, A
Poem On The Underground Wall and Patterns are conscious social frescoes.
None of these songs can compete with the hits of the year before, but side
by side they are a small testament to Simon's spirituality.
Mrs. Robinson, a catchy refrain of energetic guitar rhythms
coupled with Hal Blaine's drumming
established
the generational prestige of the duo. It is also the soundtrack of Mike
Nichols' movie "The Graduate", the story of a marginalized young man in
search of love, a story in which tens of millions of young men recognized
themselves. America, underlined by the soothing refrain of the organ, is
a more complex song that culminates with an emphatic, symphonic finale.
They are the support columns of the album Bookends (Columbia,
1968),
recorded with Hal Blaine on drums and Larry Knechtel on keyboards,
that
also includes sophisticated tunes such as Fakin' It, A Hazy Shade Of Winter,
At The Zoo, and proved the ambitions of the duo in studio production
(particularly the vocal overdubs).
With regard to the arrangements, the peak was reached with the orchestral
gospel in crescendo in Bridge Over Troubled Waters (1969),
a production tour de force (thanks to a 16-track recorder),
derived from the Swan Silvertones' gospel song Mary Don't You Weep (1955),
formed by four West Virginia miners in 1938 and converted to a melodic format
Mary Don't You Weep (1955),
that anchored the best selling album of all
time (nine million copies sold). The album (with Blaine on drums) includes the psychedelic soul of The
Boxer (one of the first songs recorded on sixteen tracks) - with
Renaissance trumpet, percussive effects that emphasize the refrain and a
cosmic grand finale for string orchestra; the Andean folk with flutes and Latin
sound of
El Condor Pasa; and the party-oriented soul of Cecilia, the epitome of Simon's
rhythmic experimentations (xylophone, hand clapping, foot stomping,
bass drum), all pieces that had little in common with folk and rock
of those years.
Simon & Garfunkel's songs had become famous thanks to their melodies, but, in
reality, they parted from the rest of rock and folk music mainly because of
the elegant, intricate and sophisticate sound that the duo crafted in the
studio.
Greatest Hits (CBS, 1972) is a compilation of all the hits.
When Simon and Garfunkel split it was almost a tragedy for those who had
grown accustomed to their characterization of the turmoil of adolescence.
Simon had two features that made him the natural interpreter of juvenile
alienation: a poetic flair for solitude and the ability to put tender
melancholy to music. The fervent populism and the sober fatalism of his
confessions touched the heart of good and bad alike, as universal prayers
do. Nobody could capture the spirit of the average American youth as Paul
Simon did in those days.
Paul Simon was the soul of the duo. He was "the sound of silence" that
nurtured the dreams and dried the tears of an entire generation. Throughout
his solo career, starting with the 1972 album Paul Simon, an eclectic and
depressed LP, Simon continued to explore the introspective easy-listening
format. Casting off the fetters of folk and vocal harmonizing, Simon
concentrated on what had always attracted him: exotic rhythms and melodies.
Indeed, a lot of his successful songs with Simon and Garfunkel had already
been influenced by the rhythms of the third world. His solo work simply
allowed him to better pursue that inclination.
The first album features
the reggae of Mother And Child Reunion and
the salsa of Me And Julio Down By The Schoolyard, while
the jubilee of Loves Me Like A Rock,
the blues of St Judy's Comet,
the solemn American Tune and
the saloon ragtime of Kodachrome embellish the eclectic
There Goes Rhymin' Simon (Columbia, 1973),
de facto an album of black music.
With Still Crazy After All These Years (1975), the masterly style of
his arrangements borders narcissism through the production of tunes that
resemble a stage play, such as Fifty Ways To Leave Your Lover.
In 1980 Simon wrote the screenplay and starred in One Trick Pony, which
produced the hit Late In The Evening. In 1981 he and Garfunkel hosted an
free concert in Central Park, New York City, for an audience of 500,000
people. Simon's alter egos - the musicologist of exotic folklore, the
innocent, dreamy teenager, the reporter of human tragedies - found a
fascinating balance in Hearts And Bones (1983), a sophisticated, mature
album that that entrusts itself to avant guard scores (Late Great Johnny
Ace) as well as anachronistic doo-wop (Rene And Georgette Magritte). It's
an album that seals twenty years of unorthodox research with gracious and
discreet ballads such as Song About The Moon and Train In The Distance.
Hearts And Bones, Simon's least successful and most criticized album yet,
despite containing
Rene and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog after the War,
was
the prelude to the African-tinged Graceland (1986), a cycle of touching
and compassionate songs that established him for good among the great composers
of music without boundaries. The vivid imagery of Boy In The Bubble, a
broken-hearted pilgrimage among the ruins of humanity, accompanied with
wavering accordion, martial drums and angelic choir, ranks among his
masterpieces.
His spiritual testament, instead, is to be found in the metaphysical vision
of Graceland, a breezy, luminous, pulsating prayer of redemption that
bridges country and gospel music.
Simon seems to wander in an imaginary past:
the frantic cajun-bluegrass rigmarole of Gumboots,
the Coasters-like sax-driven swirling novelty That Was Your Mother,
the mournful vocal harmonies of Homeless,
have the "feeling" of nostalgy, although their sound has never existed before.
He has the uncanny ability to artifically permeate a songs with that gentle,
tender, moving feeling of sentimental old things.
The jungle groove and the catchy refrain of You Can Call Me Al even suit the discos.
Even when western and African arrangements collide (I Know What I Know)
or don't quite blend (the peppy fanfare of Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes),
Simon creates a new world of sounds by grafting his sparse, gentle, melodic
folk-rock onto the funk jive of South Africa's traditional music.
Negotiations (CBS, 1988) is an anthology.
In the course of twenty years Paul Simon has established himself as one of
the most accomplished and sophisticated songwriters, able to condense, in
a few verses, simple but universal emotions by giving them, at once, a
transcendental and prophetic aura. His are not songs, they are biblical
parables. When his dialectic married sonic elements of other cultures,
those parables became more serious.
The delicate urban introspection, the humble but profound vignettes of
daily life, the stirring expressions of humane dismay, all have in common
an intense sense of compassion for the personal and public tragedies of
humanity.
The Rhythm Of the Saints (CBS, 1990) does to Brazilian music what
Graceland did to African music: it takes the rhythm, it turns it
into a cultural icon, and it grafts that icon into the stem of simple rock
and folk songs. Simon's simple and naive spirit redeems the pagan, ritual,
primitive nature of the rhythm, and views the universal message of the
civilization that produced it with the eyes of a Christian prophet.
As with Graceland, the rhythms pre-existed the songs. Simon spent
two years assembling his repertory of rhythms before committing the stories
to them. The hypnotic grooves of Obvious Child are the essence of the
album. Can't Run But, Spirit Voices and Further To Fly
populate the rhythm of sound effects and words, but can't escape the logic
of a music that was born as a rhythm. Simon also fails to deliver the touching
requiem for poverty that is certainly in his heart: dirges such as
Born At The Right Time sound artificial where the stream of
consciousness of Boy In The Bubble truly felt like a cry for a lost eden.
This is a miracle of production, but not a miracle of inspiration.
In August 1991, Paul Simon managed to break all records for a live concert:
750,000 people showed up to hear him sing.
Songs From The Capeman (Warner, 1997) was Simon's first Broadway musical
(the score mainly harks back to the 1950s).
You're the One (Warner, 1998) abandons his ambitious third-world program,
and returns Simon to simple, humble, domestic themes such as
Darling Lorraine.
After an eight-year hiatus, Simon released
Surprise (2006) that replaced the traditional Simon
pan-ethnic arrangements with producer Brian Eno's busy, multi-layered textures
(something similar to what Eno did for David Bowie in the 1970s).
However, the overall tone was one of calm, pensive, domestic rumination,
almost the opposite of the vigorous, aching, internationalism of the past
(Another Galaxy).
Paul Simon's music had always been "geographic" in that it evoked places
around the world, fueled by a constant sense of distance, and also geographic
in the sense that it mapped the emotional, existential territory of his era.
This was true at an even higher degree on
So Beautiful or So What (Universal, 2011), a humble fresco with
philosophical overtones that roamed from
Africa (The Afterlife) to India (Dazzling Blue), from
country (Love Is Eternal Sacred Light) to pop
(Love and Hard Times).
It is hard to salvage anything from Stranger to Stranger (2016), a
collection of songs that sound like leftovers. Cool Papa Bell has echoes
of the real Paul Simon.
In the Blue Light (2018) revisits old songs, mostly from his worst album,
You're the One, with stellar musicians like Bill Frisell and
Wynton Marsalis.
Seven Psalms (2023), released when he was 81, contains a single 33-minute composition in seven movements.
The first psalm, The Lord, evokes both
austere prog-rock singer-songwriters of the 1970s like John Martyn
and the pensive folkish beginning of Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven.
The Sacred Harp
Wait
The minimal instrumentation doesn't help these song take off, and makes all of
them sound verbose. They remain in a sort of quiet trance and the lyrics almost ruin the trance.
The bluesy and gospel-y My Professional Opinion is the most musical piece.
The biggest problem is that all the melodies sound "dejavu", evoking dejected
dirges from the 1960s and 1970s.
The whiny second psalm Love is like a Braid and the dirge-y Your Forgiveness could have been on countless albums of early
Neil Young or
Leonard Cohen (but they would have made them better).
The Indian-esque Trail of Volcanoes sounds like a slow-motion version of the Rolling Stones' Paint it Black.
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