Get the latest gossip
Paul Simon Invite-Only Concert Shines a Light on the Soho Sessions’ Work for Charity
An intimate, invite-only Paul Simon concert this week was the latest event from Soho Sessions to raise money for charity.
Robinson” and moving into “Slip Sliding Away,” “Mother and Child Reunion,” “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard” — which featured Yankee great Bernie Williams for an impromptu whistling solo — “Homeward Bound,” “The Boxer” and “Sounds of Silence,” accompanied by his longtime musical director Mark Stewart on guitar and cello. Williamson says the initial inspiration for Soho Sessions was the late Band drummer-vocalist Levon Helm’s famous “Midnight Ramble” concerts, held in a converted barn in Woodstock in Upstate New York, where a wide variety of musicians would get together and play classics, covers and jam for hours. But the acoustics are fantastic — after all, it was formerly a recording studio — and there’s an intangible warmth about the space that contributes to the intimacy of the concerts: When this writer attended his first Soho Session several years ago, the first person he saw when the elevator door opened was the evening’s performer, Steve Earle, sitting in a rickety folding chair, writing in a notebook.
Or read this on Variety