This resulted in the release of two singles, "You Are My Love"/"What Will I Do" in 1960 and "I'm Afraid"/"Til You've Tried Love" in 1961, Diamond's first commercially released recordings. He formed a duo with Jack Packer, a friend of his younger brother's, and as Neil & Jack they signed a publishing contract with Allied Entertainment Corporation of America and a recording contract with its subsidiary, Duel Records. In June 1958, he graduated from Abraham Lincoln High School, and that fall he enrolled at New York University as a pre-med student after winning a fencing scholarship.ĭuring this period, he spent much of his time writing songs and trying to place them at music publishing companies. He showed an early interest in music and took up singing and playing the guitar after seeing Pete Seeger perform at a camp he was attending as a teenager. Except for two years in the mid-'40s that the family spent in Wyoming while Akeeba Diamond served in the military, Diamond grew up in Brooklyn, albeit in different neighborhoods as his father moved from store to store he later claimed to have attended nine different schools and to have suffered socially as a result.
STORY OF MY LIFE SONG NEIL DIAMOND SERIES
Neil Leslie Diamond was born Januin Brooklyn, New York, the first of two sons born to Akeeba Diamond (known as Kieve), who operated and owned a series of dry goods stores in the New York City borough, and Rose (Rapoport) Diamond. Nevertheless, he remained active in the studio, returning with 2020's Classic Diamonds. During a 2018 world tour celebrating his five decades in music, it was revealed that Diamond had been diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease, ending his live career. Heading into the 2010s, Diamond continued to tour, release music, and accumulate impressive honors including his induction to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Kennedy Center Honors, and a Lifetime Achievement Grammy. His status as a still-relevant legacy artist was further bolstered by a pair of critically lauded, stripped-down albums produced by Rick Rubin during the 2000s. He branched into acting with a star turn in the 1980 remake of The Jazz Singer, which also produced major hits like "Love on the Rocks" and "America." While his popularity fell off during the latter half of the '80s and much of the '90s, Diamond remained a bankable touring act and by the end of the century, he was again on the upswing, thanks in part to a cultural resurgence of his enduring '60s hit "Sweet Caroline," which became a staple at major sporting events for teams like the Boston Red Sox. Melodic chart-toppers like "Cracklin' Rosie" and "Song Sung Blue" kept him on top and opened the door for ambitious project material like the Grammy Award-winning Jonathan Livingston Seagull soundtrack and 1976's conceptual Beautiful Noise album. In a career that began in the early 1960s as a staff songwriter at New York's legendary songwriting institution the Brill Building, he soon transitioned into performing and recording his own songs, finding success among the emerging pop singer/songwriter market with early highlights like "Solitary Man" and "Kentucky Woman." A move to Los Angeles at the end of the '60s coincided with a shift toward more adult-oriented pop and subsequently ushered in Diamond's heyday as a major star. Rising from humble roots in working-class Brooklyn to global success, Neil Diamond became one of the best-selling recording artists of the 20th century as well as a dynamic, internationally known touring act and skilled songwriter whose compositions produced numerous hits for himself and others.