BOSTON (AP) – Art Garfunkel says he would rather sing an American tune than croon about an older woman named Mrs. Robinson.

“Mrs. Robinson is a bar and grill song for me. It’s very helpful for the show, it gives rhythm and kick to the show. I like the others more,” he said at a news conference on Tuesday, just hours prior to performing with the Boston Pops.

“I do love to do “American Tune,”‘ he said referring to the song written by his former singing partner, Paul Simon. “It a lot about where are we going with this country that we love, that we feel so nervous about. So, it gets you thinking,” said Garfunkel, before singing a few bars, before a roomful of reporters.

“It’s a Bach choral, so I have a particular fondness for that because for me J.S. Bach was the greatest of them all,” said Garfunkel, who wore a a baseball cap with Fenway Park and Boston Red Sox stitched across the top.

Garfunkel said he and Simon plan to tour again beginning on June 10 in Albany, N.Y.

Their upcoming concert tour will include stops in Dallas, Houston, St. Louis, Pittsburgh and “the next group of cities we didn’t get to,” when they last toured in 2003, Garfunkel said.

“What I love is it was very sweet to work with Paul. It just worked out like a dream. It was a lot of rightness and mutual respect. Where we left off in the final shows, in Atlanta, we had taken the show to another level of knowing it and refining it. So, it’s a perfect way to finish on fertile ground. I hope to pick up where we left off,” Garfunkel said.

The duo’s 2003 concert tour was their first in two decades.

AP-ES-05-11-04 1750EDT