“I Am a Rock,” “Homeward Bound,” “Mrs. Robinson,” “The Sound of Silence.” These are just a few of the songs made famous by the hit duo Simon & Garfunkel.
Their music has inspired countless artists. Two of them, Sean Altman and Jack Skuller, are now touring the country performing in a tribute they call Forever Simon & Garfunkel.
Their concerts are filled with great music, heartwarming humor, and a spirit of keeping the love alive as they bring their own unique renditions of songs sure to evoke special memories for those who grew up listening to Simon & Garfunkel’s early hits “Hey School Girl” and “We’ve Got a Groovy Thing Goin’” as well as later hits including “Scarborough Fair,” “America,” “A Hazy Shade of Winter,” and “Cecilia.”
Altman and Skuller have definitely got a groovy thing going, and they’re bringing it to Fremont High School’s Theater at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, March 29, as part of the Fremont-Midland Entertainment Series.
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Fremont Midland Entertainment Series (FMES) members receive free admission. Tickets for individual shows cost $20 per person and can be purchased on the night of the show.
The duo, according to their website, met in 2010 when in a variety show. By 2016, they had formed the Everly Set—an Everly Brothers cover band. In 2020, they created Forever Simon & Garfunkel.
“We met onstage when Jack was just 14 years old,” Altman said.
“Despite our three-decade age gap,” Skuller said, “I’ve come to think of Sean like an older brother. Maybe a father. Maybe a grandfather,” he added, grinning.
Born in San Diego, California, Altman grew up in the Bronx, New York. A summer job at a Catskills resort exposed him to shuffleboard and vocal harmony.
“Shuffleboard fell by the wayside,” he said, “but the harmony stayed with me.”
Skuller was born in New York but grew up in New Jersey. He began writing songs and performing in school talent shows when he was just 8 years old. Watching his dad perform inspired him to pursue a career in music.
“Before meeting Sean, I never knew what it was like to sing in harmony,” he said. “Sean is a master of harmony.”
Altman began performing professionally at the age of 17 as part of the duo Moon Pudding, appearing at several New York City nightclubs. As his career in music took off, Altman put his political science studies at Brown University on the back burner.
“I joined a college a cappella group called the High Jinx,” he said, “which eventually became Rockapella.”
He also sang lead vocals for his rock group Blind Dates, releasing two national college radio hits on his dorm-room record label.
Altman is the only three-time winner of the Contemporary A Cappella Society’s “Original Song of the Year” award and has also been a recipient of their “Best Male Vocalist” award.
He currently records and performs a cappella with some other ex-Rockapella members. He has vocal-arranged and produced a cappella albums for the groups Minimum Wage and Kol Zimra. In 2005 Altman was named “Best Male Artist” in the International Acoustic Music Awards.
Skuller was an eighth grader when he participated in a three-night Simon & Garfunkel tribute show in New York City, but it was his appearance at the Hoboken Arts and Music Festival that got him his first recording contract.
In 2010 he released his first recording, “Love Is a Drum.” His ‘60s-inspired single, “Tell Me Your Heart,” which he recorded in 2014, helped earn him the Holly Prize at the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame.
It was during the pandemic that Skuller recorded an album called “My Disappearing Act.” The first single, “Anyhow,” was inspired by the isolation and apprehension caused by COVID.
“I wanted it to cultivate hope and strength to keep going,” he said, “even through adversity.”
Skuller wrote the song after a car accident in a snowstorm while Forever Simon & Garfunkel were on tour in Montana.
“We weren’t injured, but it rattled us pretty good,” he said. “We had to do a two-hour concert that night, and I had trouble making sense of what was happening. I was thankful to be alive. The accident made me realize what matters most while you’re on this planet. Moving forward, embracing creativity, and being with the people you love.”
In addition to a new outlook on life, Skuller also stepped up his musical talent.
“I spent a lot of pandemic downtime reconnecting with some of my favorite artists and albums,” he said. “Especially Willie Nelson’s ‘And Then I Wrote’ and Tom Waits’ ‘Rain Dogs.’ I rediscovered my roots in rockabilly and blues. I was a blues player at heart,” he said.
Skuller found inspiration in the early recordings by the Beatles.
“I heard those early rockabilly and rock ‘n’ roll songs they did and just got obsessed. And then I started going backwards and discovered all the ’50s musicians who had influenced the Beatles,” he said.
One singing duo whose close harmony helped pave the way for many future bands was the Everly Brothers. When they’re not celebrating the songs of Simon & Garfunkel, Altman and Skuller are performing as the Everly Set, performing such hits as “Wake Up Little Susie” (which Simon & Garfunkel also recorded), “Let It Be Me,” “Till I Kissed You,” and “All I Have To Do Is Dream.”
“When the Everly Brothers released their songs ‘Wake Up Little Susie’ and ‘Bye Bye Love,’ Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel were 15 years old,” Altman said. “They were hearing these songs, that tight two-part harmony, in Queens, New York. They had already been singing together, but they wanted to get that sound. And when Simon & Garfunkel reunited in the ‘80s, they toured with the Everly Brothers.”
Skuller recalled the challenge of learning not only that distinctive two-part harmony but also how Paul Simon played guitar.
“It’s very intricate,” he said. “And that has helped me grow a lot as a musician.”
Altman shared a portion from Simon’s autobiography regarding the tragic event that inspired the legendary songwriter to compose “The Sound of Silence.”
“In the aftermath of the Kennedy assassination and Paul’s own feelings of alienation, he was at his parents’ home in Queens,” Altman said. “And he would frequently write in the darkness in his parents’ bathroom. He would turn out the light, and he would write in there because of the acoustics.”
When performing the songs made popular by Simon & Garfunkel, Altman and Skuller never try to impersonate the original artists.
“We’re approximating them,” Altman said. “That’s part of what we bring to our Forever Simon & Garfunkel show, the way we phrase things naturally and the influence we have from so many different kinds of music.”
One aspect of their show that Altman and Skuller enjoy is hearing members of the audience share with them special memories that some of the songs bring back.
“We love it when an older couple hears us do a song that has special meaning for them,” Skuller said. “And we see them get up and dance. We also see them start to cry, and we’re right there with them, feeling that. It’s really powerful to be part of those moments and help people connect with those memories. That’s what I enjoy.”
Each performance is followed with a meet and greet, during which Altman and Skuller get to talk with the audience.
“People always tell us stories,” Altman said, “sometimes beautiful, romantic stories about how a husband and wife had danced to one song on their first date, or how another song was played at someone’s wedding, or a song was a favorite of some man’s wife and she’s no longer with us. Beautiful, heartbreaking and heartwarming stories about people’s relationships with these songs.”
FMES offers many concerts
Forever Simon & Garfunkel is just one of the shows offered through the FMES.
“We are proud to bring Forever Simon & Garfunkel to the Fremont community,” said FMES President Robert Misfeldt. “Each year we receive a package of information with dozens of artists and performers that will be available for the upcoming season. We see snippets of video and read about each performer, then we vote as a group who we want and when they are coming through the area.”
Misfeldt said performers are selected based on what type of entertainment they bring and match that up with what members have most enjoyed.
Annual membership to FMES is $60 per family, and that provides admission to six shows.
“We provide a flyer that shows all of our performances for the year,” Misfeldt said. “Tickets can also be purchased at each concert for just that show. Membership is not required.”
With many concerts booked, Altman and Skuller are on the road nine months out of the year.
“We typically don’t play major cities,” Altman said. “Most of the people who book us are in smaller cities. As a result, Jack and I have gotten to see parts of America that we normally wouldn’t see. So we really get to see America. A lot of small towns, a lot of places I normally never would’ve even heard of. A lot of farming communities, rural communities.
With those rural communities come non-human rural life, he noted.
“We drive past lots and lots of sheep and cows. And cornfields. It’s not glamorous,” Altman added, “but it’s very rewarding.”