Anne Murray - Snowbird (1970)

Snowbird is a song by the Canadian songwriter Gene MacLellan. Though it has been recorded by many performers (including Bing Crosby, Lynn Anderson, and Elvis Presley), it is best known through Anne Murrays 1969 recording, whichafter appearing as an album track in mid-1969was eventually released as a single in the summer of 1970. It was a No. 2 hit on Canadas pop chart and went to No. 1 on both the Canadian adult contemporary and country charts. The song reached No. 8 on the U.S. pop singles chart, spent six weeks at No. 1 on the U.S. adult contemporary chart, and became a surprise Top 10 U.S. country hit as well. It was certified as a gold single by the RIAA, the first American Gold record ever awarded to a Canadian solo female artist.[1] The song peaked at No. 23 on the UK Singles Chart. In 2003 it was an inaugural song inductee of the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame.[2]

Anne Murray and Gene MacLellan had met while both were regulars on the CBC television series Singalong Jubilee and Murray recorded two of MacLellans compositions, Snowbird and Biding My Time, for her first major label album release, This Way Is My Way, in 1969. Murray would recall: Gene told me he wrote [Snowbird] in twenty minutes while walking on a beach in PEI. [3]

The theme and approach broadly resemble that of the earlier hits Message to Michael (a.k.a. Kentucky Bluebird in hit versions by Lou Johnson and Adam Faith) and Yellow Bird in contrasting the narrators being stranded in the place of his/her heartache to the birds ability to just up and fly away. Snowbird sold well over a million copies and was recently picked as 19th on the 50 Tracks: The Canadian Version list, a partially populist approach to defining the most influential songs by Canadians.

Gene MacLellan made his own recording of Snowbird on his 1970 album Street Corner Preacher: MacLellans version features an additional verse to the songs standard two verse format.

In 2007 Anne Murray remade Snowbird for her Anne Murray Duets: Friends & Legends album, the song being rendered as a duet with Sarah Brightman.