Sweet Caroline

"Sweet Caroline" is a soft rock song written and performed by Neil Diamond and officially released on September 16, 1969, as a single. It was later released on December 9, 1972 as a part of Diamond's Hot August Night album. There are three distinct mixes of this song. The original mono 45 mix had a loud orchestra and glockenspiel compared to the stereo version on the Brother Love's Travelling Salvation Show LP. The third version was a remix found only on the initial CD release of Diamond's His 12 Greatest Hits. This version has the orchestra mixed down very noticeably and has the background vocals mixed up. It has a longer fade as well. The song reached #4 on the Billboard chart and eventually went platinum for sales of one million singles.

In the autumn of 1969, Diamond performed "Sweet Caroline" on several television shows. It later reached #8 on the UK singles chart in 1971. In a 2007 interview, Diamond revealed the inspiration for "Sweet Caroline" was President John F. Kennedy's daughter, Caroline Kennedy, who was eleven years old at the time. Diamond sang the song to her at her 50th birthday celebration in 2007.

As of July 2011, the song has sold 1,377,000 digital downloads.

On December 21, 2011, in an interview on the CBS Early Show, Diamond said that a magazine cover photo of Caroline Kennedy as a young child on a horse with her parents in the background created an image in his mind, and the rest of the song came together about five years after seeing the picture.