Biography

Born and raised in New York City Rob started playing the guitar at the age of 14. He had many musical influences growing up, including Elvis, The Beatles, and quite naturally Neil Diamond. Rob and his family moved to Las Vegas in 1974 and formed the group “Rock ‘n’ Roll Heaven” in 1980. The group was the city’s premiere “oldies” & classic rock group for the next 15 years with Rob achieving prominence as the leader and front man.

Rob first saw Neil Diamond when he made his Las Vegas debut opening the “Theater for the Performing Arts” at the Aladdin Hotel and Casino in 1976. Garrett said, “He held the audience, including myself, spellbound and broke all existing Las Vegas concert records at that time. I had been a fan since 1969 and I’d always thought that he had written some of the most poignant lyrics I’d ever heard. I felt that he had a way of expressing his lyrics and music in a way that no other singer/songwriter had done so before or since”.

“Rock ‘n’ Roll Heaven” covered a very wide spectrum of music and, “I did some singing impressions and would always get the strongest response when I performed my “Neil” imitation”.

In 1995 Garrett was personally hired by Paul Revere (of ‘The Raiders”) to portray Neil Diamond in the biggest and most popular “impersonation” type show in the world, “Legends In Concert”. The venue was Honolulu, Hawaii, and the show is that city’ s largest and best theatrical show. What was to be a two-month “trial” engagement for Rob ended up being “indefinite”.

“Neil’s a phenomenon as witnessed by any of his recent sold out concerts. Anytime he decides to hit the tour circuit he breaks attendance records and always ends up as one of the top 5 money grossing concert attractions of the year. He has become this polished consummate performer who doesn’t rely on big production and choreography to make his show work. He’s the last of the breed that I refer to as minstrels, the performers who get on the stage for 2 hours plus with just their guitars and backup band and can still bring an audience to it’s knees. He’s still got it, but unfortunately it seems as if he’s touring less often these days and when he does tour it’s in select places and always sold out way in advance. A lot of people who would like – never get the chance to see him perform. I love the challenge of re-creating the performances of this great musical legend who I hope still has many years of performances left in him.”

In August of 1998 Rob decided to return home to Las Vegas where he continues to perform as Neil Diamond. Currently he is co-producing (with “Legends” founder John Stuart) and directing his first “Legends In Concert” show which will be opening in Brazil, the first production of it’s kind to reach South America.

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