I love hearing from readers of my weblog linked to earlier posts - even those written years ago This is one:
"Do you know where Paul Simon stayed while in Brentwood?When I lived at 64 Crescent Road just behind the rail station, (40 years ago)- I was shown by the landlady’s son Paul Simon’s signature under the wall paper in one of the upstairs rooms. There is also an apocryphal story that he composed Kathy’s Song on Brentwood station-and that he met her first at the Railway Tavern...? Chaz in Brentwood".
In 1963, Paul Simon, was just
starting out in his career as a singer of folk songs. Born in Newark, New Jersey in October 1941, his family moved to Kew Garden
Hills, Queens in New York where he lived for the next twenty years, right
across the street to Arthur (Art) Garfunkel, born in November 1941.
Way back in the early 1960s,
Paul had begun creating music with his schoolboy chum, Art, They enjoyed the early music of the Chords,
the Crewcuts and the Drifters and later Elvis Presley. Paul’s early life was
fast-paced and he and Art were inspired by early rock ‘n’ roll music, then
writing and recording their lyrics.
Paul took off for a trip to
Europe in the early ‘60s and around that time, he met Dave McCausland, a young
Englishman, from Brentwood. Dave enjoyed
Simon’s music so much, that he asked the young American to call in at his local
Folk Club should he ever visit Brentwood.
He suggested performing at one of their
Sunday evening folk shows.
Returning home, Dave told some of his Brentwood Folk Club regulars about
the talented young American folk singer who played an extremely rare, Martin
dreadnought guitar. It wasn’t long
before Paul visited Dave’s club at the Railway Tavern in Kings Road.
Happily, a local
journalist/photographer who lived just opposite the Railway Tavern in Railway
Square turned up for Paul’s first gig. This was the late (and great) Dennis
Rookard who was then working on various national and regional radio shows,
including his beloved Hosi-Prog hospital radio.
He also made weekly recordings of the Folk Club sessions that included
some original soundtracks of Paul’s early music.
Paul became great friends of
the McCausland family and loved staying in their home whenever he came to
England. “Paul got along great with my
father – with all of us, in fact,” recalled Jonty McCausland, Dave’s younger
brother. “He played a few songs on the guitar and said he hoped to come back to
England soon and do some more shows.” At
the time, Paul was singing songs that had been recorded by Joan Baez and Bob
Dylan: “What have they done to the Rain,
“The lily of the West” and
“Geordie.” Jonty’s sister Lynne told the
author of Paul’s biography, Robert Hilburn: "Paul was special. It was like
we adopted him and he adopted us,” she said. Eventually, her father began
calling him his fifth son.”
During his earliest trip to Brentwood, Paul met a
pretty, shy, 18-year-old Kathy Chitty, who became his first serious girlfriend.
She inspired some of his songs after they met. Born in Romford, Kitty had worked
in the folk club but later their lives went in different directions. The press
had named her “Kathy, Paul Simon’s mysterious missing muse” when Paul
originally, unsuccessfully, had tried to find her. But thirty years later, at
the height of his worldwide fame, the musician eventually discovered where she
lived, and the two did mange to meet (with their families) in London. We can
thank Kathy for Paul’s distinctive famous song “Homeward Bound” as it was said,
she was his inspiration.
.JPG)
