Join the iconic duo and the more than 500,000 fans who came out for this once-in-a- lifetime 1981 benefit concert for the world’s most famous urban park. The unforgettable performance features the pair’s greatest hits, from “Mrs. Robinson” to “The Sound of Silence” to “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” as well as selections from their solo catalogs, newly arranged with an expanded 11-piece band.
Providing Support for PBS.org
Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorshipProviding Support for PBS.org
Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorshipHow to Watch Simon & Garfunkel: The Concert in Central Park
Simon & Garfunkel: The Concert in Central Park is available to stream on pbs.org and the free PBS App, available on iPhone, Apple TV, Android TV, Android smartphones, Amazon Fire TV, Amazon Fire Tablet, Roku, Samsung Smart TV, and Vizio.
About The Show
On September 19, 1981, Simon & Garfunkel reunited for a free public concert on the Great Lawn of New York City’s Central Park, raising awareness and funding to help restore the world’s most famous urban park. This unforgettable performance, which drew one of the largest audiences ever assembled for a single concert, features all of Simon & Garfunkel’s greatest hits as well as selections from their solo catalogs, newly arranged with an expanded 11-piece band.
Simon & Garfunkel, quintessential New Yorkers, embodied the spirit of the city, the times and generations of music lovers. “They stayed around the city, continuing to assimilate its cultural resources, recycle them and give them back,” Stephen Holden wrote in his review of the concert for Rolling Stone. With more than 500,000 people in attendance, THE CONCERT IN CENTRAL PARK was Simon & Garfunkel’s biggest gift to their hometown.
Their original sound, influenced by the harmonies of the Everly Brothers and the rhythms and poetic swing of Chuck Berry, made a quantum leap during the Greenwich Village folk music scene of the early 1960s. Paul Simon’s songwriting developed along provocative and topical lines in 1964, when the pair recorded Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M., their first album as Simon & Garfunkel and the first for Columbia Records.
Though their debut reached only a small audience when first released, one of the tracks, “The Sound of Silence,” a haunting acoustic recording illuminated by the signature solo and harmony vocal blends S&G invented and perfected, had been overdubbed with electric instruments and released to radio, unbeknownst to either Simon or Garfunkel. The electrified version of “The Sound of Silence” became a massive hit, one of the archetypal anthems of an emerging folk-rock movement. Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. was re-released in January 1966, alongside Simon & Garfunkel’s second studio album, Sounds of Silence, which included the electric hit single version of the song.
“The Sound of Silence” launched a long unbroken chain of hits and album successes for Simon & Garfunkel, including “I Am a Rock,” “Mrs. Robinson,” and “Bridge Over Troubled Water” from their fifth and final studio album of the same title. Going out on the high note of Bridge Over Troubled Water, Simon & Garfunkel broke up their musical partnership to pursue individual musical, artistic and personal directions.
