Today’s Jewish Birthday: Neil Diamond

Neil Diamond was born January 24, 1941 to dry goods merchant Akeeba “Kieve” Diamond and his wife Rose Rapoport, who were children of Eastern European immigrants. He attended Erasmus High School in Brooklyn with future singer Barbra Streisand and future chess master Bobby Fischer and later attended Abraham Lincoln High School with future Olympic fencer Herb Cohen. He was inspired to write songs after seeing Pete Seeger in concert at Surprise Lake Camp for Jewish children. He later worked as a waiter in the Catskills, there meeting his first of three wives Jaye Posner. He dropped out of New York University to accept a job writing songs in New York City.

He wrote songs for such groups as Jay and the Americans, the Monkees, and Deep Purple, and had others covered by Elvis Presley and Lulu. In 1966, he recorded the first of many hits as a solo artist, “Solitary Man,” and followed that year with “Cherry, Cherry” and “Kentucky Woman.” Subsequent years brought songs as “Sweet Caroline,” “Holly Holy,” “Cracklin’ Rosie” and “Song Sung Blue,” “I Am…I Said,” “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers,” “Forever in Blue Jeans.” In 1980 he starred in a remake of Al Jolson’s The Jazz Singer, which produced three more hit songs, “Love on the Rocks,” “Hello Again,” and “America.”

Diamond had two daughters with Jaye Posner, from whom he was divorced in 1969. He married Marcia Murphey that same year, and they had two sons during their 25 year marriage. In 2012 he married Katie McNeil.

Tomorrow, January 25, Volodmyr Zelensky

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SDJW condensation of a Wikipedia article