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Title: What Is It All but Luminous

Subtitle: Notes from an Underground Man

Author: Art Garfunkel

Narrator: Art Garfunkel

Format: Unabridged

Length: 5 hrs and 8 mins

Language: English

Release date: 09-26-17

Publisher: Random House Audio

Ratings: 2.5 of 5 out of 15 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Artists, Writers, & Musicians

Publisher's Summary:

From the golden-haired, curly-headed half of Simon & Garfunkel - a memoir (of sorts): artful, moving, lyrical; the making of a musician; the evolution of a man, a portrait of a lifelong friendship and collaboration that became one of the most successful singing duos of their time.

Art Garfunkel writes about his life before, during, and after Simon & Garfunkel...about their folk-rock music in the roiling age that embraced and was defined by their path-breaking sound. He writes about growing up in the 1940s and '50s (son of a traveling salesman), a middle class Jewish boy, living in a red brick semi-attached house in Kew Gardens, Queens, a kid who was different - from the age of five feeling his vocal cords "vibrating with the love of sound"...meeting Paul Simon in school, the funny guy who made Art laugh; their going on to junior high school together, of being 12 at the birth of rock 'n' roll, both of them "captured" by it; going to a recording studio in Manhattan to make a demo of their song "Hey Schoolgirl" (for $7!) and the actual record (with Paul's father on bass) going to number 40 on the national charts, selling 150,000 copies....

He writes about their becoming Simon & Garfunkel, taking the world by storm, ruling the pop charts from the time he was 16, about not being a natural performer but more a thinker...touring; sex-for-thrills on the road, reading or walking to calm down (walking across two continents - the USA and Europe). He writes of being an actor working with directors Nicolas Roeg (Bad Timing) and Mike Nichols ("the greatest of them all")...getting his master's in mathematics at Columbia; choosing music over a PhD; his slow, unfolding split with Paul and its aftermath; learning to perform on his own, giving a thousand concerts worldwide, his voice going south (a stiffening of one vocal cord) and working to get it back...about being a husband, a father, and much more.

Critic Reviews:

"Garfunkel reveals flashes of real insight about the transcendent power of music and the inner workings of a singer's life." (

Publishers Weekly)

Members Reviews:

Accept This Book For What It Is...and Isn't

I'm reviewing the Audible version. I knew what I was in for when I saw him in concert in Plymouth, MA in June 2017. His voice, once so perfect, was now a 'work in progress' as Art said. But given his age and accepting of the limitations of time the concert was fine. But...in between songs he would quote some of the rambling passages from this book. 'So there I was, drinking my freshly squeezed..lah, de, dah, de dah.' on and on nonsense. It was uncomfortable and he came across so full of himself it was insufferable at times. But...his voice brings back so many memories, as flawed as it may be in spots by age, use and health.

So why buy the Audible book? I wanted to hear 'the voice' in the cohesiveness of the book with an open mind instead of snippets and to see if his poetic style might grow on me...and it did...to a degree. Sure, would have preferred an autobiography. Nonetheless, like I said, I knew what I was buying unlike some others and it has grown on me a bit since I was coming at it a bit differently.