7 January, 1972.

Except it hasn’t, not yet. It’s still early and it’s still dark, so technically the morning is still in one piece. By the way, anybody else feel like they’re back in 1980s primary school hymn practice this morning? No? Just me then.

Originally written by English children’s author and poet Eleanor Farjeon, and allegedly inspired by the village of Alfriston in East Sussex, this was first published in 1931 as a Christian hymn.

Forty years later, in 1971, whilst recording his album Teaser and the Firecat, Cat Stevens admitted he was going through a ‘dry patch’ with regards to songwriting when he found an old hymn book in a book shop. Whilst looking through it he came across this hymn and liked it, so much so that he wrote the music for it.

Whilst Stevens wrote the chords for the melody, it was Rick Wakeman who provided the piano arrangement. At the time he had been promised a fee for writing the music but claimed in a 2000 interview that he never received any money, or any writing credits on the record. Stevens later apologised for this, claiming it was a misunderstanding with the record label, and eventually paid Wakeman. He does now appear in the writing credits for additional music.

On its release the song became a global top ten hit for Stevens, reaching number six in the US whilst here in the UK it spent thirteen weeks on the chart and peaked at number nine.