Paul Simon News

February is always an exciting time of year to plan ahead for music festival season and this week has been a busy one around these parts.

Empty, that is, except for nine microphones perched atop tall, toothpicklike stands barely casting shadows on the gently lit stage.

Here in the highly opinionated 21st century, we find ourselves in a divisive mood about so many things -- the economy, taxes, health care, the Super Bowl halftime show.

You may remember the reference to this a male choral group from South Africa in the movie "Mean Girls" or from Paul Simon's landmark Graceland album, but this a cappella vocal group has been around since 1960.

This year, I was lucky enough to catch almost all of the music documentaries and affiliated concerts at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival .

We might ask for more representation from the more "serious" side of the musical universe, lest the mass tastes dictate, but there are a number of winners in the bunch.

An A&E IndieFilms presentation of an @radical.media production in association with Sony Music Entertainment's Legacy Recordings.

An exclusive trailer for the new Paul Simon documentary, Under African Skies , has debuted on EW.com. The film follows the iconic singer-songwriter as he travels back to South Africa to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Graceland album.

In August 1986, Paul Simon released his seventh album, "Graceland," which went on to win that year's "Album of the Year" Grammy award.

Last week I interviewed the iconic folk singer-songwriter Paul Simon at the Sundance Film Festival, where he was promoting the new documentary Under African Skies .

Simon says it was a bunch of people thrown together trying different things in a studio.

The new documentary Under African Skies looks at Paul Simon's controversial decision to record parts of his classic 1986 album Graceland in South Africa, which was under apartheid rule at the time.

Watch out Nicki Minaj, there's a host of feisty, eccentric female rappers on your trail - and not all of them are here to pay their respects, discovers Paul Lester Zeitgeist is an experiment in showing trending news, topics and articles from the Guardian.

Cliche and uncreative as it may be, Graceland is one of my all-time favorite albums, so I was intrigued by the idea of Paul Simon traveling back to South Africa, reuniting with the musicians he worked with to make the album-and perhaps most importantly, sitting down with Dali Tambo, the founder of Artists Against Apartheid, and really listening to ... (more)

Growing up in the '60s, my rock-crazed generation assumed there were only three instruments -- electric guitar, bass and drums.

A new documentary screening this week at Sundance, "Under African Skies," chronicles the making of Paul Simon's 1986 solo album, "Graceland," and seeks to resolve some of the political static that has long surrounded the work.

Music being an intrinsically live medium, as well as a canned one on record and on screens, we cross-reference the experience of having seen these very artists up close and personal, and take away a taste of deeper human resonance from the connections.

Paul Simon will team up with acclaimed jazz artist Wynton Marsalis for three shows this spring at the Rose Theater in New York City.

The 2012 Sundance Film Festival in Utah isn't just about movies. Festival director John Cooper says organizers added more music to the 11-day festival this year to encourage relationships between independent filmmakers and musicians.

PARK CITY, Utah -- Paul Simon recalls his return to South Africa like a family reunion - musical brothers getting back together after decades apart.