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Is writing non-fiction less creative than imaginative writing?

I don't feel it is, personally. I write a lot of reviews, and sometimes essays, and I FEEL as though it's using the same bit of my brain as other forms of prose writing. In fact, I get the same buzz.

Poetry is a wee bit different. That comes from another bit of my brain. I can feel the switch over when it happens, because poetry doesn't happen very often.

I agree. It definitely feels like it's using a different part of the brain to that used for writing poetry, but I do think it's creative in its own way.
When I was working at the Leicester Mercury, I used to write a lot of gig reviews. Most times, they had to be written straight after the concert, to get in the first edition at 8am the next day. I used to get a huge buzz out of writing the 250 words max. under pressure - it was as much the point as seeing bands for free, I think.

Non fiction's definitely creative. After all there's not much point in writing an article, how-to guide, review, essay, etc that no one's going to voluntarily read because, no matter how much they are interested in the subject, the piece simply isn't interesting enough to read. Obviously you are not going to write a manual (which needs to be brief, to the point and absolutely clear) the same way as you would a story (which needn't be chronological and needs to hook the reader in), so there's a different type of creativity going on.

Incidently I find the best time to write reviews of live events to be immediately afterwards. Many a time I got back home from a gig and scribbled the review before going to bed. It's like writing the minutes of a meeting on the same day as the meeting: while it's still fresh and you're still carrying the atmosphere in your short term memory.

I wonder if anyone has written an account immediately after the event, and wrote another account 1 month later? It is amazing how memory plays games and enhances the writer's part. Then, isn't that the beauty of the human brain?

Bobbie