Some little known facts about Neil Diamond
Neil Diamond was born Jan24, 1941, in Brooklyn, New York, to a Jewish family descended from Russian and Polish immigrants.
At Lincoln, the school from which he received his high school diploma, he was a member of the fencing team. He later attended NYU on a fencing scholarship, specializing in épée, and was a member of the 1960 NCAA men's championship team; into his adult life he maintained his swordsmanship skills and continued to warm up with fencing exercises before his concerts. In a live interview with TV talk show host Larry King, Diamond explained his decision to study medicine by pointing out: "I actually wanted to be a laboratory biologist. I wanted to study. And I really wanted to find a cure for cancer. My grandmother had died of cancer. And I was always very good at the sciences. And I thought I would go and try and discover the cure for cancer." However, during his senior year in NYU, a music publishing company made him an offer he could not refuse: an offer to write songs for $50 a week!
As of 2001 Diamond has sold 115 million records worldwide, including 48 million records in the U.S. In terms of Billboard chart success, he is the third most successful Adult Contemporary artist ever, ranking behind only Barbra Streisand and Elton John.
Diamond was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1984, and in 2000 he received the Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Award.
On Monday, March 14, 2011, Neil Diamond was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
... from Wikipedia