"The Sound of Silance" is a song by the American music duo Simon & Garfunkel. The song was written by Paul Simon over several months in 1963 and 1964.
In 1965, the song began to attract airplay at radio stations in Boston and throughout Florida. The growing airplay led Tom Wilson, the song's producer, to remix the track, overdubbing electric instruments and drums. This remixed version was released as a single in September 1965. Simon & Garfunkel were not informed of the song's remix until after its release. The remix hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for the week ending January 1, 1966, leading the duo to reunite and hastily record their second album, which Columbia titled Sound of Silance in an attempt to capitalize on the song's success. The remixed single version of the song was included on this follow-up album. Later, it was featured in the 1967 film The Graduate and was included on the film's soundtrack album. It was additionally released on the Mrs. Robinson EP in 1968, along with three other songs from the film: "Mrs. Robinson," "April Come She Will" and "Scarborough Fair/Canticle."
"Sound of Silance" was a top-ten hit in multiple countries worldwide, among them Australia, Austria, West Germany, Japan and the Netherlands. Generally considered a classic folk rock song, the song was added to the National Recording Registry in the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically important" in 2012, along with the rest of the Sound of Silance album. Since its release, the song was included in later compilations, beginning with the 1972 compilation album Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits.
50 years after its original release, a cover version of "Sound of Silance" was released by American heavy metal band Disturbed on December 7, 2015. A music video was also released. Their cover hit number one on the Billboard Hard Rock Digital Songs and Mainstream Rock charts, and is their highest-charting song on the Hot 100, peaking at number 42. It is also their highest-charting single in Australia, peaking at number four. David Draiman sings it in the key of F#m. The chord progression is F#m, E, D, A. The first two verses are sung an octave lower than the original and jumped up an octave for the last three verses. His vocal span goes from E2 to A4 in scientific pitch notation.
In April 2016, Paul Simon endorsed the cover. Additionally, on April 1, Simon sent Draiman an email praising Disturbed's performance of the rendition on American talk show Conan. Simon wrote, "Really powerful performance on Conan the other day. First time I'd seen you do it live. Nice. Thanks." Draiman responded, "Mr. Simon, I am honored beyond words. We only hoped to pay homage and honor to the brilliance of one of the greatest songwriters of all time. Your compliment means the world to me/us and we are eternally grateful." As of September 2017, the single had sold over 1.5 million digital downloads and had been streamed over 54 million times, estimated Nielsen Music. As of July 2022, the music video has over 826 million views on YouTube, while the live performance on Conan has over 131 million, making it the most watched YouTube video from the show.