MUSIC HISTORY 101 OCTOBER 13, 1941 - Born on this day in Newark, New Jersey: Grammy Award winning singer/songwriter/actor PAUL SIMON American singer-songwriter Paul Simon is an influential figure in American rock music. Best known for his work as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel with his friend and musical partner Art Garfunkel, and for his long-running success as a solo musician, Simon has made significant contributions to the American rock tradition. Simon He has won 13 Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement Award and was selected as one of the 100 People Who Shaped the World by TIME magazine in 2006. Simon was born to Hungarian Jewish parents living in New Jersey. His father Louis (1916–1995) was a college professor, upright bass player, and dance bandleader who performed under the name Lee Sims. His mother, Belle (1910–2007), was an elementary school English teacher. In 1945, his family moved to the Kew Gardens Hills section of Flushing, Queens, in New York City. The musician Donald Fagen has described Simons childhood as that of a certain kind of New York Jew, almost a stereotype, really, to whom music and baseball are very important. I think it has to do with the parents. The parents are either immigrants or first-generation Americans who felt like outsiders, and assimilation was the key thought—they gravitated to black music and baseball looking for an alternative culture. Simon, upon hearing Fagens description, said it isnt far from the truth. Simon says about his childhood, I was a ballplayer. Id go on my bike, and Id hustle kids in stickball. He adds that his father was a New York Yankees fan: I used to listen to games with my father. He was a nice guy. Fun. Funny. Smart. He didnt play with me as much as I played with my kids. He was at work until late at night. ... Sometimes [until] two in the morning. Simons musical career began after meeting Art Garfunkel the most famous singer in the neighborhood when they were both 11. In fact, Simon credits Garfunkels performance in the 4th grade talent show as his inspiration to start singing. They performed in a production of Alice in Wonderland for their sixth grade graduation (Paul was the White Rabbit and Art was the Cheshire Cat), and began singing together when they were 13, occasionally performing at school dances. Their idols were the Everly Brothers, whom they imitated in their use of close two-part harmony. Simon also developed an interest in jazz, folk and blues, especially in musical legends Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly. They began playing together as a group called Tom and Jerry, with Simon as Jerry Landis and Garfunkel as Tom Graph, so called because he always liked to track ´graph´ hits on the pop charts. Paul took Landis as his stage surname because at the time he was dating a girl named Sue Landis. Simons first song written for himself and Garfunkel, when Simon was 12 or 13, was called The Girl for Me, and according to Simon became the neighborhood hit. His father wrote the words and chords on paper for the boys to use. That paper became the first officially copyrighted Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel song, and is now in the Library of Congress. After graduation from grade school, both Paul & Art were placed in the advanced scholastic program in junior high school. According to the Jackson bio, the two friends were required to walk through a rough part of Queens in order to get to Parsons Junior High School. Allegedly the two boys were harried and mugged daily for their dinner money. In 1957, in their mid-teens, they recorded the song Hey, Schoolgirl as Tom & Jerry, given to them by their label Big Records. The single reached #49 on the pop charts. After graduating from Forest Hills High School, Simon majored in English at Queens College, while Garfunkel studied mathematics at Columbia University in Manhattan. Simon was a brother in the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity, earned a degree in English literature, and briefly attended Brooklyn Law School after graduation, but his real passion was rock and roll. Between 1957 and 1964, Simon wrote, recorded, and released more than 30 songs, occasionally reuniting with Garfunkel as Tom & Jerry for some singles, including Our Song and Thats My Story. Most of the songs Simon recorded during that time were performed alone or with musicians other than Garfunkel. They were released on several minor record labels, such as Amy, Big, Hunt, King, Tribute, and Madison. He used several pseudonyms for these recordings, including Jerry Landis, Paul Kane and True Taylor. Simon enjoyed some moderate success in recording a few singles as part of a group called Tico and the Triumphs, including a song called Motorcycle that reached #97 on the Billboard charts in 1962. Tico and the Triumphs released four 45s. Marty Cooper, known as Tico, sang lead on several of these releases. A childhood friend, Bobby Susser, childrens songwriter, record producer, and performer, co-produced the Tico 45s with Simon. That year, Simon reached #99 on the pop charts as Jerry Landis with the novelty song The Lone Teen Ranger. Both chart singles were released on Amy Records. The two reunited a few years later, however, releasing their first album, Wednesday Morning 3AM, as Simon & Garfunkel in 1964. Although the album was a commercial failure, it set the tone for their collaborative style: slow, analytical and antithetical to most rock n roll of the time. The album also contained an acoustic version of The Sound of Silence that would later help pave the way to broader success. Dismayed by the failure of Simon and Garfunkels first album, Paul Simon released a solo album, The Paul Simon Songbook, in 1965. Once again, the album went largely unnoticed despite including tracks like I Am a Rock and Kathys Song that would later go on to become fan favorites. Commercial Success In 1966, Simon and Garfunkel took another stab at recording with the album Sounds of Silence. Included among its tracks was a re-edited version of The Sound of Silence that contained electric accompaniment. The remake became an instant hit; overnight, the duo became the darlings of literary-minded college students. Things only got better in 1967 when Simon and Garfunkel were asked to collaborate on the soundtrack to Mike Nicholss iconic film The Graduate. Released in 1968 with songs like Scarborough Fair and Mrs. Robinson, the soundtrack was a smash hit, marking Simon and Garfunkels ascendency to become one of the most popular and influential acts of the era. Simon and Garfunkel would produce only one more album together after The Graduate, however, recording Bridge Over Troubled Water in 1969. With its gospel influences, dramatic crescendo and pacifist lyrics, the title song became a cultural anthem for the 1960s generation. In 1970, Simon and Garfunkel split up due to artistic differences, freeing Simon to record a self-titled solo album in 1972. With songs like Mother and Child Reunion and Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard, Paul Simon took a distinct stylistic turn away from Simon and Garfunkels collaborative work and earned rave reviews from critics. Simon continued to release critical and commercial successes through the mid-1970s but slowed down considerably during the second half of the decade. In 1982, Simon and Garfunkel reunited for a world tour, but their subsequent attempt to record another studio album together ended in disagreement and led to many years of estrangement. Graceland and Subsequent Projects During the 1980s, Simon became fascinated by African and Brazilian music. His interests took him to South Africa in 1985, where he began recording his crowning achievement, Graceland. Combining elements of rock, zydeco, Tex-Mex, Zulu choral singing and mbaqanga, or township jive, the album captured a sound that wasnt quite like anything anyone had heard before. A groundbreaking and risky departure from Simons earlier projects, Graceland proved to be one of the unlikeliest hits of the 1980s, helping put South African music on the world stage and restoring Paul Simon to superstardom. Further exploring the idea that we are all connected on this very basic emotional level by music -- by rhythm and harmony, Paul Simon followed up Graceland with 1990s The Rhythm of the Saints. This album, which included West African guitar, American blues and Cameroonian vocalists, was another critical success -- though not quite as popular as its predecessor. Although Paul Simons unique, carefully constructed contributions to American music could be called innovative, he insists that the process has a lot to do with discovery. Im more interested in what I discover than what I invent. You dont possess it. You cant control it or dictate to it. Youre just waiting. Waiting... for the show to begin. Simon married his third and current wife, singer Edie Brickell, in 1992. They have three children. (Earlier marriages to Peggy Harper and Carrie Fisher both ended in divorce.) To date, Simon has won thirteen Grammy Awards, including one Lifetime Achievement Award. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001 and in 2007, became the first ever recipient of the Library of Congresss Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. 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Posted on: Mon, 13 Oct 2014 23:17:29 +0000
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