Stairway To Heaven (Led Zeppelin) cover

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"Stairway to Heaven" is a song by the English rock band Led Zeppelin, released in late 1971. It was composed by guitarist Jimmy Page and vocalist Robert Plant for the band's untitled fourth studio album (often called Led Zeppelin IV). It is often referred to as one of the greatest rock songs of all time. Jimmy Page told Rolling Stone in 1975, "We were careful to never release it as a single." So, Led Zeppelin refused to release the song as a single, which forced buyers to buy the entire album. Despite pressure from Atlantic Records, the band would not authorise the editing of the song for single release, making "Stairway to Heaven" one of the most well-known and popular rock songs never to have been released as a single.

The song originated in 1970 when Jimmy Page and Robert Plant were spending time at Bron-Yr-Aur, a remote cottage in Wales, following Led Zeppelin's fifth American concert tour. According to Page, he wrote the music "over a long period, the first part coming at Bron-Yr-Aur one night". Page always kept a cassette recorder around, and the idea for "Stairway" came together from bits of taped music:

The first attempts at lyrics, written by Robert Plant next to an evening log fire at Headley Grange, were partly spontaneously improvised and Page claimed, "a huge percentage of the lyrics were written there and then". Jimmy Page was strumming the chords and Robert Plant had a pencil and paper.