The Wednesday Morning “Nobody-Asked-Me-To, But-Here-I-Go-Anyway” Concert Review – Art Garfunkel

(or, Why I Will Never be A Professional Concert Reviewer…)

Well, we were certainly looking forward to this one, we two old fogies. This was a fundraiser for alternative energy gurus The Pembina Institute (http://www.pembina.org/), and I think one of only two Canadian dates. Last year was the exceptional Bonnie Raitt. Go back into the archives for that one…

One of the best shows we ever saw in Winnipeg was Paul Simon, one half of Simon & Garfunkel. Last night, we got to catch the other half of that famous partnership. The soft-voiced serious one. With the Caucasian afro. He still looks the same as he always has - like an electrocuted Q-Tip wearing a necktie.

This is trivia only, but he’s touring with James Taylor’s longtime pianist. Who knows, could be a Jeopardy question someday.

So, now we can say we’ve seen both Paul Simon, AND Art Garfunkel, just not together as Simon & Garfunkel. Which is how they’ve spent a lot of their career “together” anyhow…

Anyway, there’s a review to be done here, enough idle chit-chat!!

Mr. Garfunkel hit the stage with that unique voice of his, somewhat like frosted icing. I can’t recall which one of his own songs he started with, but it was well received. As was “Homeward Bound”, with which he followed that opener. The crowd went nuts. Clearly, we were secretly lusting for Simon & Garfunkel songs.

Which we ended up getting, happily. Over the course of over 90 minutes, Mr. Garfunkel played songs from his many solo albums, and a few surprises, like a tune by Randy Newman, and a lullaby by Mary Chapin Carpenter. But he acknowledged that the crowd seemed to light up a bit more whenever he threw in something like “El Condor Pasa”, or “Scarborough Fair”…

I sort-of expected to hear stuff like “The Boxer” (we did), but we were surprised and treated by hearing most of the Simon & Garfunkel biggies – “The Sounds of Silence”, and “Mrs. Robinson”, during which he joked about the reasons he and Paul Simon had broken up years ago. He has quite the dry wit.

Of course, he brought the flippin’ house down with “Bridge Over Troubled Water”, which wrestled out a few sniffles from MTDG beside me… That alone was worth the price of admission…The song – not the sniffles…

Add in a latin-flavoured reworking of “Cecilia”, plus too many other highlights to list, it was a crazy-terrific evening. He closed with an oldie cover from the 50’s – “Goodnight My Love”.

Not the funniest review I’ll admit, but one GREAT show!!

Chow for now!!!