Carly Simon Says She Has Parkinson’s, Breaking Years of Silence
After years out of the spotlight, Carly Simon is opening up about her health and Parkinson’s — but what, exactly, is she revealing?
In a candid note shared with Variety, Carly Simon said she has been living with Parkinson’s disease, explaining the years she’s largely stepped back from public life. The 83-year-old singer-songwriter wrote that she kept the diagnosis private while she learned how to navigate it day to day.
“So many people have written to me, kindly wondering about my relative silence, asking how I am and what I have been doing. The truth is, I have been learning how to live with Parkinson's disease,” Simon shared.
Simon described the condition’s unpredictability: some mornings she can’t marshal the energy to start the day; on better ones, she can still move, think, write and work much as before. She said worsening mobility after knee replacement surgeries and a hip replacement led doctors to look deeper; after an extensive evaluation at the Mayo Clinic, she received the Parkinson’s diagnosis.
She also disclosed she underwent surgery for basal cell carcinoma on her face. The cancer was removed, but the aftermath changed how she felt about being seen.
“The cancer was removed, but the surgery affected my appearance and made me more self-conscious about being seen in public,” Simon explained in the statement obtained by Variety.
“I have always been more critical of my appearance than anyone else could possibly imagine (check out the irony of having written ‘You're So Vain’), and this gave my inner critic quite a lot of new material,” she said.
Simon pushed back on any attempt to romanticize her condition, noting that Parkinson’s isn’t a blessing or a gift — it’s difficult, frustrating and sometimes frightening.
New music on the way
Even as life shifted, Simon kept writing. She’s completed a new album, Comes in Waves, her first full-length studio record since 2008. It’s scheduled for release on August 14, 2026 .