Morning Has Broken

The words are by the English author Eleanor Farjeon, first published in the second edition of Songs of Praise in 1931 and set to the traditional Scottish Gaelic tune Bunessan. Stevens's recording led to international recognition of the song. He began with the hymn, which takes around 45 seconds to sing, and Paul Samwell-Smith told him an album track had to run at least three minutes. Rick Wakeman played the piano and adapted a sketch of what later became Catherine Howard on his album The Six Wives of Henry VIII for the opening, middle and close. The arrangement changes key four times.

It reached number 9 in the UK and number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1972, his most successful single on the latter chart, and number 1 on the US easy listening chart. In a 2000 interview on BBC Radio 5 Live, Wakeman said he had agreed to play for 10 pounds, was left out of the credits and was never paid, and that in 2002 Stevens apologised and the record company paid him. The two performed it together at the Music for the Marsden concert at the O2 Arena in London in March 2020. Reviewing the album, Timothy Crouse of Rolling Stone called it a gorgeous hymn. Alexis Petridis wrote of the 2023 Glastonbury performance that it felt sweet and moving.