For Once in My Life was written in 1965 by Ron Miller and Orlando Murden for Motown’s publishing wing as a slow, sentimental ballad. Connie Haynes recorded it first in July 1965, but that version stayed unreleased for 50 years until a 2015 digital compilation. Miller had Jean DuShon cut a demo, and Chess Records issued her version on its Cadet label in October 1966. After Detroit’s WXYZ named it a pick hit of the week, Berry Gordy, learning his contracted writer’s song was rising on a rival label, forced Chess to drop its promotion. DuShon removed it from her nightclub act and said it no longer felt like hers.
Motown then tried the ballad with Jack Soo, Barbara McNair, the Four Tops and the Temptations, whose version became a showcase for Paul Williams, while Tony Bennett’s 1967 ballad took the song onto the pop charts. That summer, Stevie Wonder and producer Henry Cosby recorded a fast, harmonica-driven version. Gordy hated it and shelved it until quality control head Billie Jean Brown pushed him into releasing it in October 1968. It peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard pop and R&B charts, held off by Marvin Gaye’s I Heard It Through the Grapevine, another track Gordy had first rejected.
- Jack Soo, one of Motown’s first non-Black artists, claimed to be the first man to record the song.
- Paul Williams’ 1968 performance on the TCB television special is called the peak of his career.
- Frank Sinatra recorded the song in 1969.
- James Jamerson improvised the bass line so that no two bars repeat, with Uriel Jones on drums and Earl Van Dyke on piano.
- Bennett and Wonder recorded a 2006 duet that won the Grammy for Best Pop Collaboration.
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