Neil Diamond pleases faithful fans at Tampa concert

People who weren’t already die-hard Neil Diamond fans probably weren’t swayed by his 50th anniversary concert at Amalie Arena in Tampa Sunday night.

That’s probably just fine with Diamond, though, because the nearly sold-out show in the cavernous arena was packed with men and women, of a surprisingly wide age range, who obviosuly love the man and his music.

Diamond looked amazing for his age — he’s 76 — and his voice sounded pretty much the same as it did 20 and even 40 years ago.

Backed by an a phenomenal 1- piece band that he said had been pretty much with him since he started performing concerts in the 1960s, Diamond kicked off the concert with one of his earliest hits, “Cherry Cherry.” A few other uptempo songs punctuated the two-hour set (including “I’m a Believer,” a hit for the Monkees though not for Diamond) but the emphasis was solidly on his ponderous ballads. The faithful sang along and swayed to such sentimental hits as “Play Me,” “Love on the Rocks,” “September Morn” and “I Am ... I Said.”

Diamond could have easily filled two or three full concerts with songs he wrote that became mega-hits for himself and others. But he seemed more interested in chronicling all eras of his career than with playing the songs that everyone knew. He sang two songs from “Jonathan Livingston Seagull” ( a journey painted on the canvas of the hear,” he said of one song) and a number about his childhood that accompanied family photos and home home movies.

The energy in the arena waned when he veered from the hits, but the crowd still loved the songs, and cheered images of Diamond as a young man.

But a lot of his hits, especially early ones, were conspicuously absent, including “Solitary Man,” “Girl You’ll Be a Woman Soon” and “Shiloh.”

For an encore, Diamond led a sing-along on “Sweet Caroline” that seemed to go one forever. He’d finish, the band would stop, the crowd would applaud and relax, and then he’d start again after 30 seconds or so. That happened three or four times. The crowd tired of it before Diamond did.

His last number was “America,” an ode to immigration that takes on a different meaning in 2017 than it did in 1980. Diamond sang it sincerely and without irony, and even inserted a shout-out to gay people.

You could look around the arena and see people who were at the concert to accompany and appease friends, partners, spouses and parents and who were immune to the charms of Diamond’s melodramatic ballads that dominated the concert. But they were in the vast majority, and even those people danced and sang along when Diamond broke out his more upbeat hits.

The hardcore Diamond fans were in the vast majority, and they loved every minute of it.

This story was originally published April 24, 2017 at 5:18 PM with the headline "Neil Diamond pleases faithful fans at Tampa concert."