Hello, Lamppost by John Seabrook (New Yorker)...

Michael Dorf, the impresario behind the City Winery, has in recent years perfected the art of the tribute concert. The formula goes like this: select an artist to honor; recruit a bunch of other musicians to perform songs from the artist’s catalogue; and make the event a benefit for a worthy cause. Dylan, Springsteen, and R.E.M. have been among Dorf’s honorees. What makes these events so enjoyable is that they don’t seem staged; the performers become fans, and the audience feels like part of the artistic community.   So when the City Parks Foundation began to think about a benefit for Central Park’s SummerStage, which is in its twenty-fifth year, Dorf got the call. “Of course, right away I thought Simon and Garfunkel,” he said the other day, “since they are so closely associated with Central Park. I threw that out there and the foundation people loved it. So then I got in touch with a lot of artists, and told them I wanted duets, and all songs were available, except ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water,’ which we reserved in case the boys themselves showed up.” (They did show up, but did not sing.)

It was around noon on a Monday, and Dorf had asked the artists who would be performing to come by the Winery, which is on Varick Street, to run through the songs they had chosen. Among the first to arrive was Dar Williams, who had selected “We Got a Groovy Thing Goin’.”  Singing this with my sisters, literally holding a hairbrush as the mike,” she said. “This was in the early seventies, and it takes me back to going to peace rallies with my mother, and my sister had a peace sign on her stomach.”  Dean & Britta were next, doing “Homeward Bound.”  Dean: “We wanted to do ‘The Only Living Boy in New York.’ But Aimee Mann stole that one—and she’s not even a boy!” - (read more)