SWEET CAROLINE

"'Sweet Caroline'" is a pop song written and performed by Neil Diamond and officially released on September 16th 1969 as a single,and was also included on later pressings of his "Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show" album. The song reached #4 on the ''Billboard'' chart and eventually went platinum for sales of one million singles.^[1]
In the fall of 1969, Diamond performed "Sweet Caroline" on several television shows, including ''The Joey Bishop Show'', ''The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour'', and ''The Ed Sullivan Show''. It later reached #8 on the UK singles chart in 1971.
It is also very popular at sporting events worldwide, usually sung by supporters of English football team , but in North America, it has been the signature song played during Boston Red Sox games at Fenway Park. The tradition began when Amy Tobey, the club's musical coordinator at that time, started playing it in 1998 at the request of a Red Sox employee who had become a father to a girl named Caroline.^[2] She continued to play it (usually in the middle of the 8th inning) when the team was winning and she felt the Red Sox would win.^[3] Other sources deny that Amy played the song at the request of an employee and state that she played it because she liked the song and it was played at other sporting events and those crowds seemed to like it.^[4] In 2002, new owner John Henry requested that the song be played at every home game. The sing-along was made famous in a sequence of the 2005 movie ''Fever Pitch''. The song is also sung during New York Rangers hockey games, New York Mets, Washington Nationals, San Jose Giants, University of Mississippi,Vanderbilt University baseball games, and Boston College and University of North Carolina sporting events.
In the karaoke and sing-along, the chorus has fans singing "Sweet Caroline..." with the fans imitating the music to "Oh, oh, oh! Good times never felt so good" followed by the chant of "So good, so good, so good!" The next line goes "I feel inclined..." with the "Oh, oh, oh!" tag repeated.

Contents

Covers

References

External links

Covers

★ In 1970, Anthony Armstrong took it into the Top 40 of the country charts. In 1972, Bobby Womack took it into the Top 20 of the R&B charts. A number of other artists have recorded covers, including Andy Williams, Bobby Goldsboro, Elvis Presley, the Ventures, Ray Conniff, Boots Randolph, Frank Sinatra, Guster, and Waylon Jennings.

★ In 1996 film, ''Beautiful Girls'', Timothy Hutton leads a singalong performance of the song in a bar.

★ In Ireland, in December 2001, a dance version by Dustin the Turkey reached Number 1 in the singles charts, his last Number 1 hit to date. It was also covered by the punk music band Me First and the Gimme Gimmes on their ''Have a Ball''. ''Sweet Caroline'' has also been covered by Reggae group Bunny Rugs & The Upsetters in 1974 on their album ''To Love Somebody''.

★ In September of 2004, Jimmy Buffett included Sweet Caroline in a medley with "Why Don't We Get Drunk" during both of his Fenway Park shows (9/10/2004 and 9/12/2004) stating, "Never again will those songs be played together in one Medley at Fenway Park."

★ Dave Matthews Band followed suit and performed Sweet Caroline at Fenway Park on Saturday, July 8, 2006, and again on Saturday, March 24, 2007, at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, NV.

★ Also covered by the alternative band Guster, who hail from Boston, Massachusetts.

★ During U2's Popmart Tour, U2's guitarist The Edge performed several karaoke versions of Sweet Caroline.

★ The song was covered by The Railbenders, a Denver-based hard-country band on their 2003 release "Segundo".

★ Angelo Venuto recorded a techno version of the song.

★ Bobby Darin performed the song live, but at a slower, more dramatic tempo. This cover is available on the HYENA DVD Bobby Darin- Seeing is believing
According to the album literature of 1996's "In My Lifetime", Diamond came up with the famous A6 chord (used in the "...hands, touching hands" portion of the song) in the song in a hotel room one night.

References

1. http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/bio/index.jsp?pid=4456&aid=5629
2. http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/articles/2005/08/21/a_diamond_note_unique_to_the_red_sox/
3. http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/articles/2005/05/29/another_mystery_of_the_diamond_explained_at_last
4. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4930465

External links

★ NPR: The Mystery of 'Sweet Caroline' and the Sox