<Tr> <Td> </Td> <Td> "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" Roberta Flack's "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" from First Take </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Td_colspan="2"> Problems playing this file? See media help . </Td> </Tr> <P> "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" is a 1957 folk song written by British political singer / songwriter Ewan MacColl for Peggy Seeger, who later became his wife, to sing . At the time, the couple were lovers, although MacColl was married to someone else . Seeger sang the song when the duo performed in folk clubs around Britain . During the 1960s, it was recorded by various folk singers and became a major international hit for Roberta Flack in 1972, winning the Grammy Awards for Record and Song of the Year . Billboard ranked it as the No. 1 song of the year for 1972 . </P> <P> There are two differing accounts of the origin of the song . MacColl said that he wrote the song for Seeger after she asked him to pen a song for a play she was in . He wrote the song and taught it to Seeger over the telephone . Seeger said that MacColl, with whom she had begun an affair in 1957, used to send her tapes to listen to whilst they were apart and that the song was on one of them . </P>

Who sang the original song the first time ever i saw your face