EXTRACT FROM "NEIL SEDAKA SINGS LITTLE DEVIL AND HIS OTHER HITS" CD LINER NOTES

"When he was a kid, growing up in the Brooklyn district of New York, Neil Sedaka loved rollercoaster rides. His career in the entertainment world has been just that - a rollercoaster ride in which unprecedented sucess was followed by sharp downturns that would have sent many artists who were less sure of their talent reeling from the business. Not Neil Sedaka, though. If breaking up is hard to do, coming back is even harder - but Neil managed it.

From an early age, Neil, who was born March 13, 1939, knew that he wanted to become a musician. His parents, particulary his mother, wanted him to become a classical pianist. He was awarded a two-year piano scholarship at the prestigious Juilliard School of Music in New York, and Arthur Rubinstein slected him to perform on WQXR's 'Musical Talent in Our Schools' programme in 1956. Even after he had a record in the Pop charts, he continued to study piano at Juilliard.

Early on, though, Neil developed a fondness for commercial pop music. While he was still in high school he played the Jewish resort communities in the Catskills during the summer. Back in New York, he and fellow Brooklynite Carol King (then Carol Klein) hung out together, checking out all the new releases by the vocal groups, trying to discover their own slant on the music. Neil was the first to break into the music business when he and three friends formed the Tokens and landed themselves a recording contract. The Tokens later hit paydirt with "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", but when Neil was with them the best they could manage was a few local hits in New York.

Since 1952, Neil had been writing songs with Howie Greenfield, and they'd had some success. The first song they placed was "Passing Time" which was recorded by the Cookies; then they placed "Since You've Been Gone" with Clyde McPhatter, and "I Waited Too Long" with LaVerne Baker, but thy held out their highest hopes for a song called "Stupid Cupid". Their publisher didn't like it, so they took the song to a new publishing house, Aldon Music, formed by Don Kirshner (later the mastermind behind the Archies) and Al Nevins. Don Kirshner knew Connie Francis, and Connie loved "Stupid Cupid". Its success gave Neil some much needed credibility in the tough street battles of the New York music publishing industry.

Aldon was based at 1650 Bradway, across the street from the famous Brill Building. Nevins and Kirshner gave Sedaka and Greenfield a little cubicle, and they cranked out songs, usually on a day. "When I gota few hits, I got a room with a window", said Neil. Still, Neil had it as an ambition to cut his own records. Conventional wisdom would have said that he didn't look the part of the teen idol, and that - with his high voice - he didn't sound the part either. Several people told him that he should stick with writing, possibly moving into arranging and producing. Neil had cut a couple of records after leaving the Tokens, but none of them had sold, but now Kirshner, who recorded for RCA as part of the Three Suns, used the success of "Stupid Cupid" to get Neil a contract with the label. Neil was snapped up by Steve Sholes, the man who had signed Elvis Presley to RCA Victor.

Neil and Steve Sholes decided to cut "The Diary" for his first RCA single. He had written it with Howie Greenfield for Little Anthony & the Imperials. It was ment to be their follow-up to "Tears On My Pillow", but, as Neil tells it, "I used to rush home from school every day to watch Dick Clark, and one day he said, '..and now for the follow-up to 'Tears On My Pillow', and it wasn't 'The Diary'. I said, 'Oh my God, that's an omen!'". Neil saw it as an omen that he should cut it himself. After the session, he went home with an RCA record by Mickey and Sylvia, and he scratched out 'Mickey and Sylvia' to see how his name looked on RCA.

"The Diary" did well, topping out at number 14 on the American Hot 100, but it would be another year before Neil saw another good-sized hit. It came with "Oh Carol", written about his one-time girlfriend, Carole King. During the session, Neil told the vocal group to go home because they sang too perfectly; in their place, he recruited some kids who were hanging around the studio, taught them the part and then improvised a narration. When it was wrapped up, Neil knew he had his second smash hit - and he was right. "Oh Carol" also gave Carole King her first break in the record business when she recorded an answer-song called "Oh Neil".

Everyone knows the hardest thing to do is follow a hit, but Neil followed "Oh Carol" with "Stairway To Heaven", and his momentum only slipped a little when he released "You Mean Everything To Me" and "Run Samson Run". He later said that putting two songs on the same record split the airplay, but "You Mean Everything To Me" still made the Top 20, and "Run Samson Run" wasn't far behind.

Then Neil's chart career went cold again for a while. It wasn't until late in 1960 that he came storming back with "calendar Girl". Howie Greenfield had got the idea for the lyrics from an old movie listing in 'TV Guide', and by the time Neil had sweated through twenty-six takes they knew they had another winner. It was one of those magic times when everyone leaves the studio knowing that nothing can prevent the song from becoming a hit.

Neil has gone on record as saying that he found it an incredible strain to keep topping one hit with another. He used all the weapons in his arsenal, changing tempo and rhythm constantly to avoid the charge of sameiness. "Run Samson Run" had a countryish feel, while "Calendar Girl" was a shuffle. Neil even drew on his classical training for "Oh Carol" - the melody was inspired by a piece that the South American composer Villanovas had written.

"Calendar Girl" was followed by "Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen" and "Little Devil", but it wasn't until August 1962 that Neil found the ever-elusive number one record with "Breaking Up Is Hard To Do". This time, he used a Latin-tinged melody, and, for once, he wrote most of the lyrics as well as the melody. Late on the night before the session, Neil had an idea for a vocal counter-melody, "Down-doo-bee-doo-down-down". He woke up the arranger, Alan Lorber, asking him to incorporate it into the musical charts, and then he taught his counter-melody to the singers in the taxi on the way to the studio. Neil left immediately after the session for a tour of England, and it was there that he got the news that "Breaking Up Is Hard To Do" was number one.

The hits countinued unabated until the end of 1963, but the arrival of the Beatles completely changed the face of the music business almost overnight. "The balloon had burst, the dream was over", was the way Neil remembered it years later. He and Howie went back to writing songs for other people, and they had some success with the Fifth Dimensions "Working On A Groovy Thing", Tom Jones' "Puppet Man" and Tony Christie's "Amarillo", but it seemed as though the good times of the late '50s and early '60s were gone for good.

It wasn't until 1974 that Neil met Elton John, a man who recognised a well-crafted pop song when he heard one. Elton had weaned himself on a steady diet of Neil's music, and he jumped at the chance to sign Neil to his own label, Rocket Records. The first record for Rocket was "Laughter In The Rain", and it kicked off an entirely new phase of Neil Sedaka's career as both a writer and performer, one that continuous to the present day.

Reading between the lines of his interviews and his book, it's fairly clear that Neil started writing and singing pop songs so that he could get a little street credibility in the tough neigbourhood. Once he started writing and singing, though, he found something special within himself. He bridged the gap between go-for-broke rock'n'roll and Tin Pan Alley pop. Always, he had an emphasis on strong, well-crafted melodies and sold musicianship, and his songs paved the way for artists like Neil Diamond, Elton John and Barry Manilow... and even the return of Neil Sedaka himself."

COLIN ESCOTT