“Put a Little Love in Your Heart” (Jackie DeShannon)

Today’s classic song of the day is “Put a Little Love in Your Heart,” by Jackie DeShannon. It’s a timeless, universal message that resonates as much today as it did when it was first released in 1969.

Jackie DeShannon wrote (along with Jimmy Holiday and Randy Myers) and recorded “Put a Little Love in Your Heart” two years after the Summer of Love and one year after a chaotic, violent year of protests and assassinations. It expressed the sentiments of many at the time that the world could be a better place if everybody just put a little love in their hearts. It was Ms. DeShannon’s highest-charting hit as a solo artist, reaching #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #2 on the Adult Contemporary chart.

Remember these lyrics:

Take a good look around and if you’re lookin’ down
Put a little love in your heart
I hope when you decide kindness will be your guide
Put a little love in your heart
And the world will be a better place
And the world will be a better place for you and me
You just wait and see

We could stand a little more of that today.

“Put a Little Love in Your Heart” was the second universal love-themed song recorded by Ms. DeShannon, although the first she wrote herself. She’d had a previous top ten hit in 1965 with “What the World Needs Now,” written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David. Both songs are classics.

Jackie DeShannon, in addition to being a successful singer, was also a prodigious songwriter. She wrote songs that were hits for Irma Thomas (“Break-a-Way”), Brenda Lee (“Dum Dum”), the Fleetwoods (“The Great Imposter”), the Searchers (“When You Walk Into the Room”), and Kim Carnes (“Bette Davis Eyes“). Her 1972 album, Jackie, is considered an undervalued classic of the singer-songwriter era. She’s still around today, 81 years old.

The song “Put a Little Love in Your Heart” had a brief resurgence in 1988, when Annie Lennox and Al Green released a cover that was featured on the soundtrack for Bill Murray’s movie, Scrooged. That version, accompanied by the requisite MTV video, hit #9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and even higher (#2) in Canada. It fit the spirit of the movie. (No pun intended.)

And, just to cap things off, here’s Jackie DeShannon herself singing a truncated version of the song live on The Ed Sullivan Show on February 1, 1970. I cannot get enough of this song or this lady.