THE STORY OF A SONG: Roberta Flack's "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face”

A fluke connection wound up making Roberta Flack’s career. Her recording of “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” from her 1969 debut initially floundered. But all that changed after she got a call from actor Clint Eastwood, who said he wanted to use her recording of “First Time...” in the 1971 film that would mark his directing debut, Play Misty For Me. 

“He called me at home”, Flack wrote to The Guardian. “I almost passed out. He wanted to use my song only in a part of the movie where there was pure and absolute love. I told him OK, but that I wanted to re-record it because I thought it was too slow. He said, ‘No, it’s not’”. 

Clearly, Eastwood was right, because the song became Billboard’s top song for 1972. It also took the prizes for both Song and Record of the year at the Grammys. But not everyone was thrilled with Flack’s version—like songwriter Ewan Mac Coll, who had crafted it as a modest love song to his later-to-be wife, Peggy Seeger. He considered Flack’s expansive take too flowery and labored.