A Neil Diamond-Inspired Tour of New York City
Mar 26, 2024
John Friia, known as @here_in_ny on Instagram, discusses Neil Diamond’s connection to NY in a series of instagram videos! John Friia is a Licensed Tour Guide & Content Creator.
CONEY ISLAND:
Coney Island was Neil Diamond’s backyard for the first few years of his life. The singer-songwriter was born on January 24, 1941, to Rose and Akeeba Diamond and by the time Neil was four, the family moved to Cheyenne, Wyoming. Why is that? Well, that’s because his father was part of the US Army, and he was stationed there. But they did come back to Brooklyn, eventually settling in Brighton Beach. He attended Abraham Lincoln High School and this was after Erasmus Hall. It was here that he took up fencing and turned out to be really good at it. And to this day, Diamond funds a college scholarship for students at Abraham Lincoln High School for 10 graduating seniors. Now his time in Brooklyn was actually the inspiration for his song “Brooklyn Roads,” and in that he talks about living in an apartment with his family, hoping to make it big one day, and I’m pretty sure that his dream became a reality.
ERASMUS HALL:
If hallways can talk, what would they tell us? How about the story of a kid from Brooklyn that went on to sell more than 130 million records worldwide, have 39 albums, dozens of top 40 hits, and is part of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Of course, I’m talking about none other than Neil Diamond himself. His musical roots started right here in this high school, where he attended from 1954 to 1956. And one quick note about the school. This is actually one of the oldest schools in the entire country. It was founded back in 1786. It was named after Desiderius Erasmuc, who was a Dutch Renaissance Humanist and a Catholic Theologian. Now, Neil ended up joining the freshman chorus and choral club alongside fellow classmate and another famous alum. I’m pretty sure you’re familiar with her, Barbra Streisand. Yeah, but his motivation wasn’t to sing. It was because he thought it would be a great place to meet girls. And when Diamond left in 1956 because his family moved and he enrolled into a different high school, he probably never imagined coming back here more than 50 years later performing a surprise concert and with that homecoming Diamond said, “My mind changed in this place.”
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY (NYU):
You might not know this about Neil but he was really good at fencing so much so that he ended up getting a fencing scholarship to NYU in 1958. And he became part of the university’s NCAA men’s championship fencing team until 1962. And while he was here, he was studying pre-med but in reality, music was still his passion. During classes he would write song lyrics instead of paying attention. He eventually started to skip class and took the train to Tin Pan Alley where he tried to sell those lyrics, but was unsuccessful. And we’ll talk about Tin Pan Alley in another video. But he continued with his college career up until his senior year, just weeks before graduation, he would drop out for a job writing music and although he never graduated 35 years later, he received an honorary degree from NYU in 1995.
TIN PAN ALLEY:
I told you that Neil dropped out of NYU, and that’s because he got a job right here in Tin Pan Alley. Now it was a 16 week gig from Sunbeam Music Publishing, paying him $50 hours a week, or around $500 today. Now, this area was very important not only to Neil but to the music industry, and that’s because it gave birth to American pop music. From the late 19th and mid 20th centuries. Twenty Eighth Street between Fifth and Sixth avenues was the epicenter of music publishing. On this street, you would find songwriters, musicians, and music publishing companies here and this was also the place you would come to to buy sheet music of songs you liked to play back home. And you were able to find out what songs were popular based off sheet music sales, and it really paved the way for the recording industry we know today. And in case you’re wondering why it’s called Tin Pan Alley, well, there was a journalist Monroe Rosenfield, who said if you walk down this block back in the day, you will hear so many pianos being played all at once, that it sounded like tim pans crashing together. Now Neil didn’t have too much success at Sunbeam Music Publishing after his 16 weeks were up, they didn’t rehire him, and he didn’t have a hit for eight years, but that changed with “Solitary Man.”
John/ABN’s Tin Pan Alley video
THE BITTER END:
When you talk about Neil’s music career, you have to include The Bitter End right here on Bleecker Street. And for Neil, it really wasn’t a bitter end, but rather a sweet beginning. It was the 1960s, and Neil was in the very early stages of his musical career. He was actually hired to perform here. So how did the audience react? Well, he doesn’t have any bad memories so he says it was good. The Bitter End is also a piece of New York City history because it’s the oldest rock and roll club in the city, opening in 1961. It became the spot for songwriters which made it the perfect location for Neil Diamond. In 1967, he made his television debut live from here, and decades later, after he left The Bitter End, he returned performing the surprise concert in 2008.
John/ABN’s The Bitter End video
THE BRILL BUILDING:
Name one songwriter that came out of The Brill Building. I mean, the list is endless, really. There’s Carole King, Neil Sedaka and of course, Neil Diamond. Now, as the popularity of Tin Pan Alley faded, The Brill Building was the spot where hits were recorded, written, and published. Inside writers like Neil could take their work and bring it to a number of publishers to have them buy it. You go to another floor to get an arrangement, hire musicians, record a demo, find a record label, managers, and even work with promoters to get it on the radio. Now Neil first found success here in 1965, writing “Sunday and Me.” He eventually connected with The Monkees and wrote a number of their hits including “I’m A Believer,” which, of course, Neil went on to record his own version.
John/ABN’s The Brill Building video
BIRDLAND JAZZ CLUB:
You might say this was another turning point in Neil’s musical career. It was the 1960s and he was facing a lot of rejection. He ended up renting a storage room above the original Birdland Jazz Club, which was right behind me. He paid $35 a month for that space. Inside was a payphone, a small desk, and a piano. That’s it. He was still writing music, but this time on his own and without a publishing company. Neil would sell around one song a week and really just scraped by having 35 cents a day to spend on food. But that tiny space gave him the chance to just focus on writing without distractions. Neil says, quote, something new began to happen. He started to develop his own style, eventually writing “Solitary Man.” He did something different with this song. It was the first time he recorded a song under his name. Prior to this, he would just sing for the demos to sell the song he wrote to singers. Neil has said that this song remains one of his personal favorites, because it really reflects how he felt as an unsuccessful songwriter in the early days of his career, but now he’s shifted from songwriter to performer.
John/ABN’s Birdland Jazz Club video
WINTER GARDEN THEATRE:
Did you know that A Beautiful Noise is not the first time Neil Diamond has been on Broadway? For that, let’s hop into the Delorean and go back to the year 1972. Neil Diamond is hosting a one-man show for twenty consecutive nights right here at the Winter Garden Theatre, and he became one of the first rock stars to have his name on a Broadway marquee. Now, we’re used to seeing musicians host a mini-Broadway residency, but in the 1970s, it wasn’t so common. It was reported that all of the nearly 1,600 seats were sold out for every performance. Opening Night was October 5th, 1972, and the New York Times praised Neil in their writeup, calling him a brash young man with a musical track record and a presence to command the stage. A half a century later, Neil Diamond came back to Broadway in a different way.
John/ABN’s Winter garden Theatre video
BROADHURST THEATRE:
JOHN: Let’s go backstage at the Broadhurst Theatre with Nick to show us a little tribute to Neil Diamond that you might not have noticed.
NICK: What we’re going to do is take you into the Broadhurst Theatre and we’re going to bring you to the Neil Diamond reserved seats. Very VIP. And we have the two reserved seats. Boom, boom. “Reserved for Neil Diamond.” These are the real special ones.
JOHN: Producer Ken Davenport added those as a symbolic way of showing that Neil is always in the theatre.
NICK: Alright, so, on Opening Night, when we had Neil Diamond here, he actually sang, “Sweet Caroline,” in front of all these screaming, crazed fans, and he was unbelievable. It was the first time, I think, he had sang in quite some time, and he was incredible, and people were tearing up. I teared up. It was super emotional and it was amazing. But, yeah, he was right there with his wife. It was awesome.
JOHN: For a more in-depth look of Neil Diamond’s New York, you can check out the new audio tour. You’ll get insight from the show’s producer, along with Nick, and learn more about the New York that shaped Neil.
John/ABN’s Broadhurst Theatre video
For the full audio tour of Neil Diamond’s New York, click here.