“I cried when he told me how much I had hurt him”: singer Art Garfunkel on emotional reunion with Paul Simon

In later interviews and memoirs, Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel often spoke very bitterly about each other. When Simon recorded a solo single early in their collaboration, Garfunkel was angry. “The friendship was destroyed for life…I never forget, and I never truly forgive,” Garfunkel wrote in his memoir.

Simon, for his part, couldn’t stomach the fact that Garfunkel also wanted an acting career. In the late 1960s, Garfunkel appeared in several films, he also wrote music for the film ‘Watership Down’, with the hit ‘Bright Eyes’. “I think if Artie had become a big movie star, he would have left,” Simon wrote in his memoir.

“Instead of just being the guy who sang Paul Simon songs, he could be Art Garfunkel, a big star in his own right… This got me thinking about how I could still be the guy who wrote songs and sang them “I didn’t need Artie,” he said.

Simon took the initiative for the break. In 2015, Garfunkel said in an interview: “How can you walk away from this happy place on top of the world, Paul? What’s wrong with you, you idiot? How could you let that go, you jerk?” In 2016, Simon stated: “To be honest, we don’t get along. So it’s not fun (to perform together, ed.). So that will never happen again.”