The human voice is the most important instrument at our disposal, yet it is one of the most difficult to understand or define.

You either hear it, or you don't. It either moves you, or it leaves you cold...it is more than just a sound...it is the soul itself.

------Neil Diamond, 1974.

From the first scratchy demo cut in 1958, it was there. From the first songs, with their timeless doo-wop sound and youthful innocence, it was there. From the first singles, performed with brash confidence, it was there. The Diamond magic, present from the beginning, went on to become one of the overarching forces in music. Today, nearly forty years since the kid from Brooklyn figured out that writing songs was a cool thing to do, Neil Diamond is recognized as one of the pivotal figures in pop history. To seal the deal, Columbia/Legacy presents IN MY LIFETIME, the Neil Diamond boxed set, featuring 37 hit singles, 16 previously unissued early demos, alternate versions of well-known Diamond classics, and the newly written and recorded title track. This is the only deluxe Diamond collection in existence to include material covering the superstar's tenure at Columbia, Bang, MCA, and Capitol Records. To put it mildly, this box rocks!

Naturally, it wouldn't be a true-blue boxed set without extra goodies, and this collection has plenty of them. Comprised of three CDs and 70 songs, the package also includes a full-color 72-page booklet with extensive liner notes by noted pop musicologist David Wild, a revealing interview with Diamond, scores of rare photos, a complete discography, and insightful annotations of the recorded material written by the artist himself. Compiled and packaged with the full involvement of Diamond every step of the way, IN MY LIFETIME provides the definitive retrospective on a singularly remarkable career in music.

For anyone alive during those exciting formative years of rock and roll, this set is a full-court press of memories. Neil kicks it off with the title track, a cleverly and movingly engineered soundscape which compresses the music and history-making events of the last three decades into a few minutes. It's followed by "Hear Them Bells," the very first song Diamond ever wrote, recorded live at a recent concert. Simplistic though it is, it's easy to detect Diamond's lifelong passion for pop music, and his gift for writing pop tunes.

The first CD contains demos recorded long before Diamond first broke into the Top 10 with "Cherry, Cherry" thirty years ago; among them his 1961 debut demo for Columbia, "At Night," and a 1964 track written by Diamond for Dion DiMucci titled "Straw In The Wind." Other songs included are: "A Million Miles Away," "A Good Kind of Lonely," and "Flame" (all demos from the early 60's); "What Will I Do" (recorded when Diamond was part of the duo Neil & Jack); "Clown Town" (from Diamond's debut Columbia single in 1961); chart topping hits such as "Cherry, Cherry" (two versions included), "Solitary Man," "I Got The Feeling (Oh No, No)," "I'm A Believer" (#1 for the Monkees in 1966); "Kentucky Woman," the Top 10 "Girl, You'll Be A Woman Soon," "You Got To Me," "Thank The Lord For The Night Time," "Shilo," "Sweet Caroline," "Holly Holy," and "Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show."

Songs on the second CD include: Diamond's first #1 pop hit, 1970's "Cracklin' Rosie," "Soolaimon," "Play Me," "I Am... I Said," "Song Sung Blue" (#1 in 1972), "Be," "Longfellow Serenade," a home demo of "Beautiful Noise," "Dry Your Eyes" (from Martin Scorsese's live concert film "The Last Waltz"), "September Morn," "Forever in Blue Jeans," "Desiree," and Diamond's #1 1978 hit duet with Barbra Streisand, "You Don't Bring Me Flowers."

Included on the third CD are: "Hello Again," "America," and "Love on the Rocks" (all from the soundtrack to The Jazz Singer), "Scotch on the Rocks" (a demo), "Yesterday's Songs," "I'm Alive," "Heartlight," "If There Were No Dreams," "Headed For The Future," "Hooked On The Memory of You," "You Make It Feel Like Christmas," and "Everybody." The disc also contains a number of recordings never before released, including "Heaven Can Wait," "Just Need To Love You More," "Falling," "Dancing To The Party Next Door," and "I'm Sayin' I'm Sorry."

The happy saga of Neil Diamond is one American tale well worth repeating. At age 16, he received a guitar as a birthday present, and soon he focused on lessons and, later, songwriting. He later attended NYU as a pre-med student on a fencing scholarship, but songwriting remained his first love. He left college six months before graduating to accept a songwriter's position with a publishing company for $50 a week, and has never regretted the decision. Diamond eventually leased an office on Broadway for $35 a month where he could devote all his time to writing. After several lean years, he was approached by producers Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich. This meeting led to his eventual signing with Bang Records.

At his first Bang session in 1966, Neil recorded what would become his first three hit singles: "Solitary Man," "Cherry, Cherry," and "I Got The Feeling (Oh No, No)." He also scored his first #1 record as a writer with the Monkees' "I'm A Believer." Diamond's Bang Records catalog included the albums The Feel of Neil Diamond (his 1966 debut), Just For You (1967), Neil Diamond's Greatest Hits (1968) and Shilo (1970).

1969 brought him his biggest record of the early years, "Sweet Caroline," from the album Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show/Sweet Caroline, an album that combined gospel themes with pop formats. The following year, he released the albums Touching You Touching Me, which included the hit single "Holly Holy," and Tap Root Manuscript (1970), which experimented with African-inspired arrangements. Other albums from this period include Velvet Gloves and Spit (1968), Stones (1971) and Moods (1972), with hits like the #1 "Cracklin' Rosie," "Song Sung Blue" (also #1), and "I Am...I Said." Hot August Night, a double-album recorded live at the Greek Theater in 1972 is another immortal Diamond album of the period.

Diamond's reputation as a charismatic performer grew steadily in the 70s. In 1972, the Schubert Organization presented him in concert for a record-setting 20 performances of a one-man show at the Winter Garden Theater, making Neil the first rock-era superstar to headline on Broadway. At the height of his touring popularity, Diamond announced a sabbatical from the stage to devote more time to his family, but in 1976, he resumed performing with record- breaking tours of Australia and New Zealand.

In 1973, Neil signed with Columbia, with which he has enjoyed his greatest successes. His first release for the label, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, became his #2 all-time best-seller and earned him Grammy and Golden Globe awards. In 1974 he released Serenade, which yielded the hit, "Longfellow Serenade." In 1976 he recorded the platinum Beautiful Noise with producer Robbie Robertson.

The late 70s found Diamond on both the radio and TV airwaves. In 1976, he returned to the Greek Theater for eight SRO shows, resulting in his first TV special and his second live LP, 1977's platinum Love At The Greek. On the singles charts, his 1978 duet ballad with Barbra Streisand, "You Don't Bring Me Flowers," reached #1. I'm Glad You're Here With Me Tonight (1977), You Don't Bring Me Flowers (1978), and September Morn (1980) continued his streak of RIAA-certified platinum albums.

Diamond achieved another breakthrough starring in the 1980 remake of "The Jazz Singer." Besides sharing the screen with Sir Laurence Olivier, he composed and performed the film's soundtrack. The multi-platinum soundtrack album was the source of "Love On The Rocks," "America," and "Hello Again," all Top 10 singles.

On The Way To The Sky, Heartlight (containing the title track, a Top Five hit in 1982) and Primitive demonstrated Diamond's artistic vitality in the 80's, while Classics/The Early Years re-released Diamond's great early hits for a new generation to discover. 1986's Headed For The Future showcased an innovative modern sound. His 1987 live LP, Hot August Night II, was a potent reminder why Diamond has consistently been one of the biggest draws in America, and 1988's The Best Years Of Our Lives proved to be a songwriting showcase for Diamond. Following the 1991 release of Lovescape, Diamond embarked on the critically acclaimed "Love In The Round" World Tour, performed on a 360-degree stage in the middle of every arena.

His 1992 release, Neil Diamond - The Greatest Hits 1966-1992, has been certified platinum, and the "Love In The Round" Tour was one of the highest-grossing tours in the world for two years running. The Christmas Album became a Top 10 platinum best-seller, and "Neil Diamond's Christmas Special," which premiered on HBO in 1992, and aired on ABC-TV in 1993, has been made available to home video on Columbia Music Video. The one-hour special features Diamond performing many of the favorites heard on The Christmas Album while joined by such diverse vocal ensembles as a doo-wop group, children's choir and mixed chorale. Neil followed this up in 1994 with a second volume of holiday favorites, The Christmas Album Vol. II, which duplicated the success of the first edition.

In 1993, Neil recorded Up On The Roof - Songs From The Brill Building, which paid homage to the songs and songwriters from the Golden Age of pop in the 50s and 60s. It featured sixteen of Neil's favorites from the era by such top songwriting teams as Goffin & King, Mann & Weill, Leiber & Stoller, and Bacharach & David. The album explored Diamond's musical roots and cast new light on these immortal hits. Then in 1994, he released Live In America, a remarkable set recorded live on Diamond's heralded two-year-long record-breaking "Love In The Round" world tour.

He followed that album with one earlier this year, the critically acclaimed RIAA gold- certified Tennessee Moon, recorded in Nashville with some of the city's top musicians, and featuring an astonishingly vibrant collection of new Diamond songs. This fall, Columbia Music Video releases an exciting new home video, Neil Diamond... Under A Tennessee Moon, culled from the TV special aired as a companion to the CD. Among other highlights, it contains the video Neil made with Waylon Jennings for "One Good Love," as well as the "Marry Me" video featuring Buffy Lawson and wedding footage sent in by fans. The numbers speak for themselves: over his career, Diamond has sold 110 million records and set box office records at major venues across the U.S and around the world.

In his own commentary on IN MY LIFETIME, Diamond reveals, "There's something inside me that's released when I'm able to write music... Listening to this compilation is like having my life pass before my ears: personal moments, aspirations, things I was sure nobody would ever hear, all returning to trigger memories." David Wild described Diamond in his liner notes as "a songwriter's songwriter... a symbol of evolving manhood, both solitary and otherwise." Actually, solitude is something Neil Diamond doesn't need to worry about. After thirty years of unparalleled affection from fans around the world, it's obvious that in his lifetime, Neil Diamond will never have to go it alone.