Stairway to Heaven

"Stairway to Heaven" is a song by the English rock band Led Zeppelin, released on 8 November 1971 on the band's untitled fourth studio album (commonly known as Led Zeppelin IV), by Atlantic Records. Composed by the band's guitarist Jimmy Page with lyrics written by lead singer Robert Plant, it is widely regarded as one of the greatest rock songs of all time.<ref name="Spin">Template:Cite magazine</ref><ref name="Gigwise">Template:Cite news</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The song has three sections, each one progressively increasing in tempo and volume. The song begins in a slow tempo with acoustic instruments (guitar and recorders) before introducing electric instruments. The final section is an uptempo hard rock arrangement, highlighted by Page's guitar solo and Plant's vocals, which ends with the plaintive a cappella line: "And she's buying a stairway to heaven".

"Stairway to Heaven" was voted number three in 2000 by VH1 on its list of the "100 Greatest Rock Songs",<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> in 2004 Rolling Stone magazine ranked "Stairway to Heaven" number 31 on its "500 Greatest Songs of All Time" list.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> It was the most-requested song on FM radio stations in the United States at the time, despite never having been commercially released as a single in the US.<ref name=Complete>Template:Cite book.</ref> In November 2007, through download sales promoting Led Zeppelin's Mothership release, "Stairway to Heaven" reached number 37 on the UK Singles Chart.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Writing and recording

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".<ref name="MOJO">Sutcliffe, Phil (April 2000). "Bustle in the Hedgerow". MOJO, p. 62</ref> Page always kept a cassette recorder around, and the idea for "Stairway to Heaven" came together from bits of taped music.<ref name="Light">Tolinski, Brad and di Benedetto, Greg (January 1998). "Light and Shade: A Historic Look at the Entire Led Zeppelin Catalogue Through the Eyes of Guitarist/Producer/Mastermind Jimmy Page". Guitar World, p. 100–104.</ref> 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".<ref name="Light" /> Page was strumming the chords, and Plant had a pencil and paper.

Led Zeppelin began recording "Stairway to Heaven" in December 1970 at Island Records' new recording studios on Basing Street in London.<ref name=Schulps>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The song was completed by the addition of lyrics by Plant during the sessions for Led Zeppelin IV at Headley Grange, Hampshire, in 1971.<ref name="RS1985">Template:Cite magazine</ref> Page then returned to Island Studios to record his guitar solo.<ref name="Complete"/>

The complete studio recording was released on Led Zeppelin IV in November 1971. The band's record label, Atlantic Records, wanted to issue it as a single, but the band's manager Peter Grant refused requests to do so in both 1972 and 1973. As a result, many people bought the fourth album as if it were the single.<ref name="Complete"/>

Composition

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"Stairway to Heaven" is described as progressive rock,Template:Sfn<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> folk rock,Template:Sfn and hard rock.Template:Sfn The song consists of three sections, beginning with a quiet introduction on a finger-picked, six-string acoustic guitar and four recorders (ending at 2:15) and gradually moving into a slow electric middle section (2:16–5:33), then a long guitar solo (5:34–6:44), before the faster hard rock final section (6:45–7:45), ending with a short vocals-only epilogue.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> Plant sings the opening, middle and epilogue sections in his mid-vocal range; he sings the hard rock section in his higher range, which borders on falsetto.

Written in the key of A minor, the song opens with an arpeggiated, finger-picked guitar chord progression with a chromatic descending bassline A-G♯-G-F♯-F. Page used a Harmony Sovereign H1260 acoustic guitar and a Fender Electric XII 12-string electric guitar played directly into the board for the rhythm parts.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> John Paul Jones contributed overdubbed four recorders (probably soprano, alto, tenor, and bass) in the opening section (he used a Mellotron and, later, a Yamaha CP-70B Grand Piano and Yamaha GX1 to synthesise this arrangement in live performances) and a Hohner Electra-Piano electric piano in the middle section.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="Total Guitar" />

The sections build with more guitar layers, each complementary to the intro, with the drums entering at 4:18. The extended guitar solo in the song's final section was played for the recording on a 1959 Fender Telecaster given to Page by Jeff Beck (an instrument he used extensively with the Yardbirds) plugged into a Supro amplifier, although in an interview he gave to Guitar World magazine, Page said, "It could have been a Marshall, but I can't remember".<ref name="Total Guitar" /><ref name="JPinterview">Steven Rosen, 1977 Jimmy Page Interview Template:Webarchive, Modern Guitars, 25 May 2007 (originally published in the July 1977, issue of Guitar Player magazine).</ref><ref name="Light" /> Three improvised solos were recorded, with Page agonising about which to keep. Page later revealed, "I did have the first phrase worked out, and then there was the link phrase. I did check them out beforehand before the tape ran." He has likened the song to an orgasm.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The Am–G–F–G chord sequence in the third section of the song, centred on A minor, is typical of a chord progression in the Aeolian mode.Template:Sfn

Personnel

According to Jean-Michel Guesdon and Philippe Margotin:Template:Sfn

• Robert Plant – vocals
• Jimmy Page – acoustic guitars (six-string and twelve-string), electric guitars
• John Paul Jones – bass guitar, electric piano, Mellotron, synth bass, recorder
• John Bonham – drums

Live performances

The inaugural public performance of the song took place at Belfast's Ulster Hall on 5 March 1971.<ref name="Total Guitar">Llewellyn, Sian (December 1998). "Stairway to Heaven". Total Guitar, p.61-62</ref> Bassist John Paul Jones recalls that the crowd was unimpressed: "They were all bored to tears waiting to hear something they knew."<ref name="bbc">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The world radio premiere of "Stairway to Heaven" was recorded at the Paris Cinema on 1 April 1971, in front of a live studio audience, and broadcast three days later on the BBC.<ref name="Guitar World122">Pallett, Simon (January 1998). "Radio Dazed". Guitar World, p.122</ref> The song was performed at almost every subsequent Led Zeppelin concert, only being omitted on rare occasions when shows were cut short for curfews or technical issues. The band's final performance of the song was in Berlin on 7 July 1980, which was also their last full-length concert until 10 December 2007 at London's O2 Arena.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

File:Джимми Пэйдж.jpg

Jimmy Page used a double-necked guitar to perform "Stairway to Heaven" live.

When playing the song live, the band would often extend it to over 10 minutes, with Page playing an extended guitar solo and Plant adding a number of lyrical ad-libs, such as "Does anybody remember laughter?", "And I think you can see that", "wait a minute!" and "I hope so".Template:Citation needed For performing this song live, Page used a Gibson EDS-1275 double neck guitar so that he would not have to pause when switching from a six to a 12-string guitar, while John Paul Jones used a Mellotron to replicate the sound of the woodwind instruments he used on the studio recording.

By 1975, the band was using the song as its finale in concert. However, after their concert tour of the United States in 1977, Plant began to tire of "Stairway to Heaven": "There's only so many times you can sing it and mean it...It just became sanctimonious."<ref>Dave Lewis and Simon Pallett (1997) Led Zeppelin: The Concert File, London: Omnibus Press. Template:ISBN, p. 58.</ref>

The song was played again by the surviving members of Led Zeppelin at the Live Aid concert in 1985;<ref name="Total Guitar" /> at the Atlantic Records 40th Anniversary concert in 1988, with Jason Bonham on drums;Template:Sfn and by Jimmy Page as an instrumental version on his solo tours.

The first few bars were played alone during Page and Plant tours in lieu of the final notes of "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You", and in November 1994 Page and Plant performed an acoustic version of the song at a Tokyo news station for Japanese television. "Stairway to Heaven" was also performed at Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert at the O2 Arena, London on 10 December 2007.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Plant cites the most unusual performance of the song ever as being that performed at Live Aid: "with two drummers (Phil Collins and Tony Thompson) while Duran Duran cried at the side of the stage – there was something quite surreal about that."<ref name="Total Guitar" />

Sunset Sound mix

A different version of this song by Led Zeppelin is on the remastered deluxe two-CD version of Led Zeppelin IV. Titled "Stairway to Heaven Template:Small", it was recorded on 5 December 1970, at Island Studio, No. 1, in London with engineer Andy Johns and assistant engineer Diggs. This version runs 8:04, two seconds longer than the original version.<ref>Template:Cite magazine "It's always interesting to hear stuff that you know really well and hear it differently, but the same", John Paul Jones tells Rolling Stone.</ref>

Success and legacy

"Stairway to Heaven" is often rated among the greatest rock songs of all time.<ref name="Spin" /><ref name="Gigwise" /> Music journalist Stephen Davis wrote that the 1971 song ascended to "anthemic" status within two years.Template:Sfn Page recalled, "I knew it was good. I didn't know it was going to become like an anthem, but I did know it was the gem of the album, sure."Template:Sfn

"Stairway to Heaven" continues to top radio lists of the greatest rock songs, including a 2006 Guitar World readers poll of greatest guitar solos.<ref name="SuperSeventies">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> On the 20th anniversary of the original release of the song, it was announced via US radio sources that the song had logged an estimated 2,874,000 radio plays.<ref name="Complete"/> As of 2000, the song had been broadcast on radio over three million times.<ref name=tripleJ>Australian Broadcasting Corporation Template:Webarchive – Triple J Music Specials – Led Zeppelin (first broadcast 12 July 2000)</ref> In 1990, a Tampa Bay, Florida, area station (then WKRL) kicked off its all-Led Zeppelin format by playing "Stairway to Heaven" for 24 hours straight.<ref name="RSbio">Template:Cite magazine</ref> It is also the biggest-selling single piece of sheet music in rock history, with an average of 15,000 copies yearly.<ref name="Total Guitar" /> In total, over one million copies have been sold.<ref name=tripleJ/>

The band never authorised the song to be edited for single release, despite pressure from Atlantic Records. Page told Rolling Stone in 1975, "We were careful to never release it as a single",<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> which forced buyers to buy the entire album.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine put it at number 31 on their list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time", then number 61 in 2021.<ref name="rollingstone.com">Template:Cite magazine</ref> On 29 January 2009, Guitar World magazine rated Jimmy Page's guitar solo the best of the publication's 100 Greatest Guitar Solos in Rock and Roll History.<ref name=solo>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In 2001, the New York City-based classic rock radio station WAXQ conducted a listener survey to create a countdown of 1,043 rock songs (the number corresponding with the station's position on the dial at 104.3 FM). "Stairway to Heaven" garnered the most votes from listeners. WAXQ has conducted the survey annually since then; in each subsequent countdown that has followed, including the most recent in November 2024, "Stairway to Heaven" has been the top-ranked song.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Plant once gave $10,000 to listener-supported radio station KBOO in Portland, Oregon, during a pledge drive after the disc jockey solicited donations by promising the station would never play "Stairway to Heaven". Plant was station-surfing in a rental car he was driving to the Oregon Coast after a solo performance in Portland and was impressed with the non-mainstream music the station presented. When asked later for the reason why, Plant replied that it wasn't that he didn't like the song, but he'd heard it before.<ref>Template:Cite episode</ref>

"Stairway to Heaven" was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry in 2023, based on its "cultural, historical or aesthetic importance in the nation's recorded sound heritage."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="loc2">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The carillon in the tower of Fürth's historic town hall plays "Stairway to Heaven" daily at 12:04 pm.<ref>Fürth: Glock’n’Roll mit Himmelsleiter. Bayerischer Rundfunk. 15 November 2024.</ref>

Spirit copyright infringement lawsuit

Page's opening acoustic guitar arpeggios bear a resemblance to the 1968 instrumental "Taurus" by the Los Angeles-based rock band Spirit, written by Spirit guitarist Randy California.<ref name="MOJO" /><ref>"Whammy Bar" Guitar World April 1997: 19 "But California's most enduring legacy may well be the fingerpicked acoustic theme of the song "Taurus", which Jimmy Page lifted virtually note for note for the introduction to "Stairway to Heaven".</ref> In the liner notes to the 1996 reissue of Spirit's self-titled debut album, California wrote: "People always ask me why 'Stairway to Heaven' sounds exactly like 'Taurus', which was released two years earlier. I know Led Zeppelin also played 'Fresh Garbage' in their live set. They opened up for us on their first American tour."<ref>Sleeve notes, booklet included with CD EPC 485175</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In May 2014, Spirit bassist Mark Andes and a trust acting on behalf of California filed a copyright infringement suit against Led Zeppelin and injunction against the "release of the album containing the song" in an attempt to obtain a writing credit for California, who died in 1997.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> A lack of resources was cited as one of the reasons that Spirit did not file the suit earlier; according to a friend of California's mother, "Nobody had any money, and they thought the statute of limitations was doneTemplate:Nbsp... It will be nice if Randy got the credit." If the Spirit lawsuit had been successful, past earnings due to the song—estimated at more than US$550 million—would not have been part of the settlement, but the publisher and composers might have been entitled to a share of future profits.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

On 11 April 2016, Los Angeles district judge Gary Klausner ruled that there were enough similarities between the song and the instrumental for a jury to decide the claim, and a trial was scheduled for 10 May. The copyright infringement action was brought by Michael Skidmore, a trustee for the late guitarist, whose legal name was Randy Wolfe.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> On 23 June, the jury ruled that the similarities between the songs did not amount to copyright infringement.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In July, Skidmore's attorney filed a notice of appeal against the court's decision.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In March 2017, the verdict was appealed, with a main argument being that the jury should have been able to hear a recorded version of "Taurus".<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> On 28 September 2018, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit allowed the appeal, vacating in part and remanding to the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California for a new trial on several evidentiary and procedural issues.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> On 10 June 2019, the Ninth Circuit granted rehearing en banc, meaning the case would be reheard by a larger panel of eleven judges.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>

A Bloomberg Businessweek article shortly after that decision noted that a Ninth Circuit judge's interpretation of the laws implied that key elements of many classic rock songs, including "Stairway to Heaven", that were recorded prior to 1978 were not protected by copyright to begin with. The panel declared that the scope of copyright for those songs is limited to what was included in the deposit copy of the song's sheet music provided to the Copyright Office; at trial Page had testified that the deposit copy included neither the intro that was under dispute nor his guitar solo. Bloomberg reporter Vernon Silver found that the deposit copies of other classic rock songs from that era, such as "Hotel California", "Born to Run" and "Free Bird", include only the song's basic chords, lyrics and melody, without any solos or other distinctive musical touches. Copyright law experts could not say whether those elements are copyrighted or not; Led Zeppelin's lawyers have argued they are even if not included in the deposit copy. Silver made an electronic mashup of several of these elements from different songs and included it with the article.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

On 9 March 2020, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco, California, ruled in favour of Led Zeppelin, in that "Stairway to Heaven" does not infringe on the copyright of "Taurus". The full Ninth Circuit used their decision to overturn the controversial "inverse ratio rule" upon which it had relied over the past several decades in past copyright rulings, stating "Because the inverse ratio rule, which is not part of the copyright statute, defies logic, and creates uncertainty for the courts and the parties, we take this opportunity to abrogate the rule in the Ninth Circuit and overrule our prior cases to the contrary."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> This verdict immediately applied to pending cases within the Ninth: a long battle over Katy Perry's "Dark Horse" in which a jury had found against her for Template:USD was overturned a week after the Ninth's verdict in "Stairway to Heaven", in part of the Ninth's new finding and that in the case of "Dark Horse", the similarity argument weighed heavily on the inverse ratio rule.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> On 5 October, the Supreme Court of the United States denied to grant certiorari to Andes and the trust, leaving the Ninth Circuit's ruling in place in favour of Led Zeppelin.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The court's decision precludes further appeals, thus ending the copyright dispute.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Claims of backmasking

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In a January 1982 broadcast of the Trinity Broadcasting Network television program Praise the Lord hosted by Paul Crouch, it was claimed that hidden messages were contained in many popular rock songs through a technique called backmasking. One example of such hidden messages that was prominently cited was in "Stairway to Heaven".<ref>Denisoff, R. Serge. Inside MTV (1988): 289–290</ref> The alleged message, which occurs during the middle section of the song ("If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now...") when played backward, was purported to contain the Satanic references: "Here's to my sweet Satan / The one whose little path would make me sad whose power is Satan, / He'll give you, he'll give you 666 / There was a little tool shed where he made us suffer, sad Satan."<ref>Arar, Yardena. (AP) "Does Satan Lurk in the Backward Playing of Records?" St. Petersburg Independent 24 May 1982: 3A</ref>

Following the claims made in the television program, California assemblyman Phil Wyman proposed a state law that would require warning labels on records containing backmasking. In April 1982, the Consumer Protection and Toxic Materials Committee of the California State Assembly held a hearing on backmasking in popular music, during which "Stairway to Heaven" was played backward and self-described "neuroscientific researcher" William Yarroll claimed that the human brain could decipher backward messages.<ref>Billiter, Bill. "Satanic Messages Played Back for Assembly Panel" Los Angeles Times 28 April 1982: B3</ref>

The band itself has mostly ignored such claims. Swan Song Records responded to the allegations by stating: "Our turntables only play in one direction—forwards." Led Zeppelin audio engineer Eddie Kramer called the allegations "totally and utterly ridiculous. Why would they want to spend so much studio time doing something so dumb?"Template:Sfn Robert Plant expressed frustration with the accusations in a 1983 interview in Musician magazine: "To me it's very sad, because 'Stairway to Heaven' was written with every best intention, and as far as reversing tapes and putting messages on the end, that's not my idea of making music."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Accolades

Accolades

Publication	Country	Accolade	Year	Rank
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame	US	"The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll"<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	1994	*
Classic Rock	UK	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	1999	1
VH1	US	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	2000	3
RIAA	US	"Songs of the Century"<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>	2001	53
Grammy Awards	US	"Grammy Hall of Fame Award"<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	2003	*
Rolling Stone	US	"The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time"<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>	2004	31
Rolling Stone	US	"The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time"<ref name="rollingstone.com"/>	2021	61
Q	UK	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	2003	47
Toby Creswell	Australia	"1001 Songs: the Great Songs of All Time"Template:Sfn	2005	*
Q	UK	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	2006	8
Guitar World	US	"100 Greatest Guitar Solos"<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>	2006	1
Rolling Stone	US	"100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time"<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>	2008	8

(*) designates unordered lists.

Charts

Digital download

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Chart (2007–10)	Peak position
Canadian Billboard Hot Digital Singles Chart<ref name="Canadian singles chart">Template:Cite magazine</ref>	17
EU Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart<ref name="Canadian singles chart" />	79
Irish Singles Chart<ref name="Irish singles chart">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	24
New Zealand RIANZ Singles Chart<ref name="New Zealand singles chart">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	13
Norwegian Singles Chart<ref name="Norwegian singles chart">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	5
Portuguese Singles Chart<ref name="Canadian singles chart" />	8
Swedish Singles Chart<ref name="Swedish singles chart">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	57
Swiss Singles Chart<ref name="Swiss singles chart">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	17
UK Singles Chart<ref>Template:Citation</ref>	37
US Billboard Hot Digital Songs Chart<ref name="US digital songs chart">Template:Cite magazine</ref>	30
US Billboard Hot Singles Recurrents Chart<ref name="Canadian singles chart" />	16

Note: The official UK Singles Chart incorporated legal downloads as of 17 April 2005.

See also

• Template:Slink
• List of Led Zeppelin songs written or inspired by others

Bibliography

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Further reading

• Led Zeppelin: Dazed and Confused: The Stories Behind Every Song, by Chris Welch, Template:ISBN
• The Complete Guide to the Music of Led Zeppelin, by Dave Lewis, Template:ISBN

External links

• NPR Fresh Air audio interview with Robert Plant (2004), who comments on various covers of the song, the lyrics and writing it.
• Jimmy Page: How we wrote Stairway to Heaven (2014) at BBC
• Sold on Song, "Stairway to Heaven" at BBC Radio 2