During the 1960’s Art Garfunkel teamed with Paul Simon to produce some of the most memorable music of their times. Few have forgotten songs like “The Sound of Silence,” “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” “The Boxer,” “Mrs. Robinson” or my personal favorite “America.” Together they earned eight Grammy Awards, including one for lifetime achievement, and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

But they could never achieve the personal harmony that they could with their voices. By 1970 they were done. Since then they’ve spewed a little venom at each other, vowed to never get back together, then reunited for a handful of special occasions like a 1981 concert in Central Park, a 2003 U.S. tour following the lifetime achievement award and a free concert at the Colisseum in Rome before a massive audience. 

What has Garfunkel been doing all these years when he wasn’t swearing off or reuniting with Paul Simon? He did a bit of acting, most notably in the Mike Nichols films Catch-22 and Carnal Knowledge. (It was Nichols who had engaged Simon & Garfunkel to do the sound track for his film The Graduate, including the song “Mrs. Robinson.”) He also did a few random TV gigs.

And he read a lot. 

“In June 1968, incidentally the year Simon and Garfunkel released Bookends, Garfunkel decided to start listing every book he read. The singer kept this up through his and Simon’s acrimonious 1970 break-up and four reunions over the subsequent four decades. 

“It’s fair to assume Garfunkel is still reading as voraciously as ever and logging each title as he goes. However, in October 2013, he let the public in on his little game, listing the shelf-splintering 1195 books he had read over the past 45 years on his website. Fortunately for us, Garfunkel has distilled the list to just 157 favourites. 

“It’s still not a bitesize reading list, but one can get a snapshot of the singer’s refined taste in literature. Alongside dense classics like Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace and James Joyce’s Ulysses are some more culturally contemporary page-turners like Stephen King’s The Shining and Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James.” (Jordan Potter, Far Out Magazine, Nov. 18, 2023 )

When he wasn’t reading he was walking. The guy who sang “America” would later walk it. Hartford Courant rock critic Roger Catlin described that in a story published Aug. 18, 1994.

“…he has been making more headlines lately for his long hikes. Whenever he can fit it in, he’s strolling across the country in weeklong segments, flying in, walking about 100 miles, then flying home. ‘It’s kind of a freaking out, which I think is very healthy,’ he says. After walking across Japan in the ’80s, he started on the United States. ‘And I’m almost finished now. I’ve gone from New York to Idaho. I just crossed into Idaho a few weeks ago.’”

In an interview with the Guardian (June 24, 2015 ) Garfunkel talked about the people he met on his walks.

“The world is a very friendly place. People mind their own business. They all want to get to heaven in their own quiet way. Gangs do not roam the earth – 99.999% of the earth. I had one incident in Ohio. It was Friday night, and that’s very telling. When the sun goes down on a Friday night, people get a little nutty. There were three guys in a car, they threw a beer can at me, it was three-quarters full and it hit me on the sternum. That was an ouch. I thought I’d broken a bone.

“They didn’t recognise me. They were just assholes being mischievous and drunk. It was an Ohio thing.”

Garfunkel would later set off on foot to cross Europe, starting in western Ireland and ending up in Istanbul.

In 1989, Garfunkel published a book. “Still water runs deep for Art Garfunkel, the high, clear voice of Simon and Garfunkel, and ‘Still Water’ is the title of his new book of prose poems. ‘Does it help to feel better about a painful memory by writing about it? Not really. It doesn’t have anything to do with it,’ he said. Some of the 84 poems in the book concern the suicide of his girlfriend, Laurie Bird, in 1979.” (AP, Nov. 29, 1989)

Twice, while in his 60’s, Garfunkel was busted for pot. 

“Singer Art Garfunkel, who pleaded guilty last year to pot possession in upstate New York, was charged again Sunday after a marijuana cigarette was allegedly found in the ashtray of his car, state police said.

“The 63-year-old Garfunkel, who lives in Manhattan, was charged after being pulled over for failing to stop his vehicle at a stop sign, The Daily Freeman of Kingston reported Tuesday.

“Upon approaching Garfunkel’s car, a trooper noticed a strong odor of marijuana and a subsequent search turned up a joint in the ashtray, the newspaper reported. He was issued a ticket and is due back in Woodstock Town Court on Sept. 22.

“In January 2004, Garfunkel was charged with marijuana possession after state police stopped his limousine for speeding in the Ulster County town of Hurley, which is near Woodstock some 55 miles southwest of Albany. During that stop, police found a small amount of pot in Garfunkel’s jacket.

“The next month, he pleaded guilty and paid $200 in fines.” (AP, Aug. 30, 2005 )

Garfunkel would later try his hand at a memoir, “What Is It All but Luminous: Notes from an Underground Man.” It got a less than stallar review in the Washington Post (Sibbie O’Sullivan, Sept. 13, 2017 ).

“Garfunkel’s book…is a splattering of 30-plus years of handwritten thoughts, lists, travel notes, bad poetry, confessions, snarky digs, platitudes and prayers gussied up for publication in different fonts and sizes.

“Reading it is like rummaging through a huge junk drawer of the mind. You might find something useful. Garfunkel himself seems doubtful of his endeavor: ‘Maybe my unusual book does communicate.’ Or maybe it doesn’t, which is sad because Garfunkel, the angel-voiced half of Simon and Garfunkel, and a successful solo act, is a talented, educated and seemingly loving man. Unfortunately, the singer — who at 75 continues to tour — is more successful behind the microphone than he is on the page.

“The book is also filled with such gnomic statements as: ‘You can’t discover fuchsia twice.’ ‘Morality played to win is a plate of tin.’ ‘My poetry bits are organs. What is the least connective tissue that sets them in a body?’

O’Sullivan is suggesting, perhaps, that Garfunkel should stick to singing. That is something he never stopped doing, making solo records and touring throughout his lifetime. That is, except for one scary interruption.

“In January 2010, Art began experiencing vocal problems after choking on a piece of lobster at a restaurant. The incident caused him to have a hoarse voice and issues swallowing. After a trip to the doctor, the performer was told that one of his vocal cords was stiff and thicker than the other one. 

“​​’As the weeks ensued, I saw that I couldn’t finesse my singing in the mid-range,’ Art told Rolling Stone in February 2014. ‘I could do the high notes and the low notes. High notes are my stock in trade, thank God. But I couldn’t sing, ‘When you’re weary, feeling small.’ I couldn’t do anything in the middle where you need that finesse. It’s indescribable. I was crude instead of fine.’” (Sanantha Agate, June 1, 2023, Closer Weekly)

He told Bill Nutt of the Central New Jersey Home News (Oct. 9, 2015) “I’ve been singing since I was 5 years old… I have to be a singer.” 

Garfunkel did recover his voice and was back on the road touring by 2014. Lately, he has enjoyed being part of a new duo, singing with his son.

“There is a new duo in town: Garfunkel & Garfunkel. If the name seems oddly familiar, well, it is exactly what it appears to be. At the age of 82, the great American vocalist Art Garfunkel has teamed up with his 33-year-old musician son, Art Garfunkel Jr., to record an album of close harmony duets, prosaically titled Father and Son.

“The harmonic blend on Father and Son is gorgeous, as they harmonise and interweave to lush orchestral and band backing on classics of the American songbook, some old 1950s and 1960s favourites of Garfunkel Senior’s by the Everly Brothers and Cat Stevens, and some very effective versions of Eighties pop songs that are favourites of Junior’s (including the first single, an interpretation of Cyndi Lauper’s Time After Time, released today). (Neil McCormick, Chief Music Critic, The Telegraph, Sept. 20, 2024 )

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