The song's melody was inspired byElvis Presley, with Hammond imagining it as being sung by Presley "in lavish style" at the Olympics' opening ceremony.[1] It appeared on the aforementioned1988 Summer Olympics Album: One Moment in Time compilation album, which (in addition to Houston) also featured artists such asThe Four Tops,The Bee Gees,Eric Carmen,Taylor Dayne and film composerJohn Williams. The track is an anthem for believing in yourself against all odds as Houston asks for "One moment in time/when I'm racing with destiny/Then, in that one moment of time, I will feel eternity."
Houston recorded the song in May 1988 while in London for nine consecutive sold-out concerts atWembley Arena during herMoment of Truth World Tour.[2] Houston's vocals and orchestral backing by theLondon Symphony Orchestra were recorded at the AIR Studios complex owned by former Beatles producerGeorge Martin, with additional backing recorded at Walden'sTarpan Studios inSan Rafael, California. AtClive Davis's request, Houston recorded a final set of vocals at her home studio inMendham Township, New Jersey in July 1988. According to Walden, Houston resented that Davis had interrupted her brief rest at home during a year-long world tour but agreed to make the final recording.
"One Moment in Time" was released byArista Records on August 27, 1988, as the first single from1988 Summer Olympics Album: One Moment in Time, the soundtrackfor the Games inSeoul,South Korea.[3] The song debuted at number 57 on theBillboard Hot 100, the issue dated September 10, 1988.[4] Nine weeks later, it peaked at number five on the chart, the issue date of November 12, 1988, becoming Houston's tenth top 10 hit on the Hot 100, and spent 17 weeks on the chart.[5] It also debuted on theBillboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs (formerly "Hot Black Singles") at number 78, the issue dated September 17, 1988, and six weeks later reached a peak of 22, her lowest position on the R&B chart at the time.[6] On the issue date of November 5, 1988, the single peaked at number one on theBillboard Hot Adult Contemporary chart, making it her seventh number-one single on the chart, and stayed on the top for two weeks.[7][8] It ranked number 89 on theBillboard Hot 100Year-End chart of 1988.[9]
Worldwide, it was a big hit. In the United Kingdom, the song entered theUK Singles Chart at number 24, the week ending date of September 24, 1988, and within four weeks of its release reached the top position, a peak it maintained for two weeks, becoming Houston's third UK number-one single.[10][11] The single was certifiedSilver by theBritish Phonographic Industry (BPI) for shipments of 200,000 copies on October 1, 1988.[12] According toThe Official Charts Company, the single has sold 400,000 copies in the country.[13] In West Germany, it debuted at number 58 on theMedia Control Top 100 Singles chart, the week dated September 26, 1988, and the following week went straight into the top ten.[14] On October 24, 1988, the fifth week of its release, the song reached number one on the chart and stayed there for two weeks, making it her second West German number-one hit.[15] The single was certifiedGold for shipments of 250,000 copies or more by theBundesverband Musikindustrie (BVMI) in 1988.[16] Across Europe, "One Moment in Time" was successful, topping theEuropean Hot 100 Singles chart for five weeks. It peaked inside the top five in Austria,[17] Belgium,[18] Finland, Iceland, Norway,[19] Sweden,[20] and Switzerland,[21] and reached top ten in France[22] and the Netherlands.[23] But the single became a minor hit in Oceania region, peaking at number 53 and 34 on the singles chart, in Australia and New Zealand, respectively.[24][25] The song re-entered the UK Singles Chart for week ending February 18, 2012, following Houston's death.[26]
Pan-European magazineMusic & Media described "One Moment in Time" as "a grand ballad in a pompous production byNarada Michael Walden."[27] Following Houston's death,Entertainment Weekly published a list of her 25 best songs and ranked it #14 because: "TheSeoul Olympics needed an anthem, and Houston rose to meet the challenge with this majestic carpe diem chest-thumper. The song, a staple of sports montages, yielded one of Houston's all-time best performances at the 1989 Grammys ceremony."[28]
1989: Houston performed the song at the opening of the31st Grammy Awards on February 22, 1989, where she was nominated for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female.[29] This performance was broadcast live onCBS and released on the videos and CD:Grammy's Greatest Moments, Vol II (1994),[30][31] andWhitney: The Greatest Hits (2000).[32] It also appears on the CD/DVDLive: Her Greatest Performances.
1989: Houston performed the song duringSammy Davis Jr.'s 60th Anniversary Celebration in Show Business, taped at theShrine Auditorium inLos Angeles on November 13, 1989 and broadcast onABC on February 4, 1990.[33][34]
1992: Houston performed the song at the 1992 Olympic Flag Jam atAtlanta'sGeorgia Dome on September 17, 1992. The concert, which Houston co-hosted with Dick Clark, was organized to welcome the Olympic flag to Atlanta ahead of the city hosting the1996 Summer Olympics.[35]
Themusic video for the song does not show Houston performing the song but is a basic collage of clips from the1988 Summer Olympics. It opens from a clip of the Olympic torch in Seoul as a black and white video until the lighting of the cauldron at the opening ceremony is shown, during which it fades to color. As the song plays throughout, more scenes from the games are shown. When the chorus is sung for the last time, midway through it, scenes of the awarding of winners are depicted. The video ends with the aforementioned games' cauldron blazing.The featured athletes includeFlorence Griffith Joyner,Greg Louganis,Janet Evans,Kennedy McKinney,Matt Biondi,Phoebe Mills,Rosa Mota,John Smith, andSergey Bubka.
* Sales figures based on certification alone. ^ Shipments figures based on certification alone. ‡ Sales+streaming figures based on certification alone.
"One Moment in Time" was performed live by then-11-year-oldTeodora Sava in the auditions of the first edition of the Romanian children's talent showNext Star in 2013. Her performance gathered praise and positive reactions from all of the judges (who were seeing her for the first time) and online, and had 2.65 million combinedYouTube views, making her well known to a wider audience inRomania and abroad.[86][87][88] Soon after, she recorded the song in a studio.[89]
British instrumental rock groupthe Shadows did a version on their 1989 album,Steppin' to the Shadows: 16 Great Tracks As Only the Shadows Can Play Them.[90]
Appropriately for the song's origins as an Olympic anthem, British Olympic gold medal-winning heptathleteDenise Lewis selected the song as one of her eight recordings on the BBC'sDesert Island Discs in February 2012. That same month, the song was featured at the beginning of the2012 Brit Awards at London'sO2 Arena in tribute to Houston (who had died earlier in the month), accompanied by a 30-second-video montage of her music videos.[92]
^Walden, Narada Michael (2012).Whitney Houston: The Voice, The Music, The Inspiration. San Rafael, CA: Insight Editions. pp. 64–71.ISBN978-1-60887-200-8.
^Anderson, Kyle; Goldblatt, Henry; Greenblatt, Leah; Rahman, Ray (February 17, 2012)."Whitney Houston: Her 25 Best Songs".Entertainment Weekly. Archived fromthe original on December 11, 2013. RetrievedMarch 16, 2012.
