Stairway to Heaven (Neil Sedaka song)

"Stairway to Heaven" is a song written by Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield. It was released as a 45 rpm single and appeared on Sedaka's 1960 album Neil Sedaka Sings Little Devil and His Other Hits.

Not to be confused with the Led Zeppelin song, "Stairway to Heaven".
"Stairway to Heaven"
Single by Neil Sedaka
from the album Neil Sedaka Sings Little Devil and His Other Hits; Neil Sedaka Sings His Greatest Hits
B-side"Forty Winks Away"
Released1960
Recorded1960
GenrePop
LabelRCA Victor
Songwriter(s)Neil Sedaka
Howard Greenfield
Neil Sedaka singles chronology
"Oh! Carol"
(1959)		 "Stairway to Heaven"
(1960)		 "You Mean Everything to Me"
(1960)

Sedaka's "Stairway to Heaven" predates by 11 years Led Zeppelin's song of the same name, which was released in 1971 and written by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant. Sedaka remarked in 2021: "You can't copyright a title, so Led Zeppelin, I forgive you!"[1]

Composition

Sedaka described the song as a "sandwich song:" the main verses and chorus, the "meat" of the song, are enveloped in a "bread," a short musical snippet repeated at the beginning and end of the song (in this case, the phrase "Climb up, way up high"). The style would become a trademark of Sedaka and Greenfield's compositions of the early 1960s.[2]

Personnel

The personnel includes King Curtis on saxophone, Don Arnone, Art Ryerson and Everett Barksdale on guitar, Milt Hinton on bass, Irving Faberman on timpani and Dave "Panama" Francis on drums.

Reception

"Stairway to Heaven" became a hit for Sedaka after "Oh! Carol" (1958). In 1960, it repeated the performance of the previous single by peaking at number nine on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart.[3]

Chart performance
Chart (1960) Peak
position
Canada (CHUM Chart)[4] 16
UK Singles (The Official Charts Company)[5] 8
US Billboard Hot 100 9

References
  1. Sedaka's mini-concert, January 7, 2021
  2. Sedaka's mini-concert, May 13, 2021
  3. "Neil Sedaka". history-of-rock.com.
  4. "CHUM Hit Parade - May 2, 1960".
  5. "officialcharts.com". officialcharts.com. Retrieved August 16, 2022.


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