"I Will Always Love You" is a song by American singer Whitney Houston released on November 2, 1992, via Arista Records for the soundtrack to The Bodyguard, her film debut.
[11] In 2004, Houston's version of "I Will Always Love You" placed at number 65 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs survey of top tunes in American cinema.
It was her co-star Kevin Costner who suggested "I Will Always Love You", playing her Linda Ronstadt's 1975 version from her album Prisoner in Disguise.
Sheet music for Houston's version of this song shows the key of A major in common time with a tempo of "freely" at 60 beats per minute.
Larry Flick of Billboard wrote that the song is "bolstered by a remarkably restrained (and ultimately effective) vocal by Houston.
She builds to dramatic, heartfelt conclusion that makes sense, given the unusually slow-building created by producer David Foster.
"[20] Randy Clark of Cashbox noted that "the unstoppable voice and unquestionable talent of Whitney Houston will no doubt come roaring back onto the charts with this cover".
"[22] John Martinucci of Gavin Report asserted that Houston "delivers a powerful rendition that reminds us of her natural abilities as a singer with or without musical accompaniment.
Her voice breaking and tensing, she treats the song as a series of emotional bursts in a steady climb toward a final full-out declamation.
[24] Peter Stanton of Smash Hits commented, "A slow intro moulds into a crescendo of huggy-kissy-smoochiness that could melt the heart of the yeti of Northern Siberia.
"[25] Writing for USA Today on November 17, 1992, James T. Jones IV labeled it a "tour-de-force", and added "[Houston] gives a 31⁄2-star [out of four] performance.
Chris Willman of the Los Angeles Times commented that the singer "has the goods to deliver on the tune's haunting beauty and resists overpowering it – until the finale, when the key change and stratospheric notes drain all the heart-rending sadness out of the song and make it sound like just another anthem of survival.
[35] The song stayed at number one in the U.S. throughout January and February 1993, making it the first time Billboard did not rank a new number-one single until March of the new year.
Houston's ten-week reign in the UK was the longest run at the top by a solo female artist in the history of the British singles chart, until it was overtaken by Tones & I in 2019.
The January 9, 1993, issue of Billboard reported it had broken its own record for most copies sold in a single week for any song in the Nielsen SoundScan era.
This record was broken by Elton John's "Candle in the Wind 1997/Something About the Way You Look Tonight", which sold 3.4 million in the final week of September 1997.
[58][59] On January 12, 2022, the single was certified Diamond by the RIAA for selling 10 million equivalent sales units from sales and streams, becoming the second-eldest song in history to do so after Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" and the third song overall in the 20th century to do so, preceded by "Bohemian Rhapsody" and Mariah Carey's 1994 Christmas single, "All I Want for Christmas is You".
The song eventually peaked at number three (two spots shy of repeating the feat achieved by Chubby Checker when "The Twist" returned to the top position after previously falling off the chart).
[73] In 2020, "I Will Always Love You" was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
In return, Parton thanked Houston for bringing her song to a wider audience and increasing the amount of royalties in the process.
The video then cuts to the singer in a dark blue suit sitting in an empty theater with the spotlight shining on her, singing of her love, and when she starts her dramatic vocal finale, the theater changes into open camp surrounded by snow, which is meant to be at Fallen Leaf Lake, California, where The Bodyguard's boat scene was filmed.
At the time of the video's shooting the singer was pregnant with her daughter Bobbi Kristina, so she is shown only sitting in the theater scenes.
Jennifer Hudson performed the song in front of Houston, who received The BET Honors Award for Entertainer Lifetime Achievement spanning over 25 years in the industry.
Since Houston's death in 2012, many other artists have performed tributes to the late singer's version of the song, including on February 12, 2012, when Hudson performed the song as a tribute during the 54th Annual Grammy Awards, the day after Houston's death, alongside images of musicians who had died in 2011 and 2012, including Amy Winehouse and Etta James.