There was a time when Neil Diamond seemed almost inseparable from the act of writing songs. In the early years of his career, songwriting was not something he could simply switch on and off. It was part of his daily life, his ambition, and eventually the foundation of everything that followed.
Diamond came up during the 1960s, when young songwriters in New York were expected to produce constantly. The Brill Building era was built around that kind of discipline. Writers worked under pressure, chasing melodies, rewriting lyrics, and trying to create the next song that might finally break through.
Diamond learned to work that way.
Before he became a recording star himself, he spent years writing songs for other performers and trying to establish himself in an intensely competitive industry. The routine demanded persistence. A songwriter couldn’t always wait for inspiration to arrive; sometimes the job was simply to sit down and keep working until something appeared.
Eventually, that habit helped produce the songs that changed Diamond’s career.
By the late 1960s, he was no longer just a struggling songwriter. Hits such as “Cherry, Cherry,” “Sweet Caroline,” and “Cracklin’ Rosie” transformed him into a major recording artist, and songwriting became closely tied to his public identity.
But success changed the circumstances around the creative process.
Once Diamond had become a superstar, he no longer had to write simply to survive in the business. He had the freedom to choose projects, take his time, revisit old material, and decide when a song was actually worth recording.
That meant the relentless habits of his younger years no longer served the same purpose.
There was also another important shift: Diamond had accumulated decades of experience. The young songwriter who once had to prove himself was eventually replaced by an established artist who understood exactly how much pressure came with releasing new music.
Instead of constantly chasing another hit, he could become more selective.
That does not mean Diamond stopped being a songwriter. Far from it. Even after stepping away from touring, he continued to remain involved with music and creative work. His 2018 retirement from touring was prompted by his Parkinson’s diagnosis, not by a decision to abandon songwriting altogether.
In fact, that distinction is important.
Diamond’s relationship with music evolved, rather than simply ending. The pace changed. The enormous demands of touring disappeared, and the creative process could become more personal and less tied to maintaining a nonstop public career.
For an artist who had spent so many years working at full speed, slowing down was itself a major change.
The songwriter who once needed to keep producing in order to move forward had eventually reached a point where he could allow a song to take its time.
And perhaps that was the most natural evolution of all.
Neil Diamond didn’t walk away from songwriting because he had nothing left to say. He walked away from the relentless pace that had once defined his career, proving that sometimes changing how you create is not the same thing as giving up on creativity.