Old Friends (Simon & Garfunkel song)
"Old Friends" is a song by the American music duo Simon & Garfunkel from their fourth studio album, Bookends (1968).[2] The song observes two men sitting "on a park bench like bookends" and imagines them young, one pondering to the other how strange it will feel to near the end of their lifetimes.[3] The short companion song "Bookends Theme (Reprise)," addresses loss and the fleeting nature of memories, and of time spent together.On the album "Old Friends," the title generally conveys the introduction or ending of sections, and the song builds upon a "rather loose formal structure" that at first includes an acoustic guitar and soft mood.Horns and other instruments are added when the duo cease singing, creating a turbulence that builds to a single high, sustained note on the strings,[3] possibly implying medical emergency and one of the friends' deaths.