Songbird (Fleetwood Mac song)  "Songbird" is a popular song by British-American rock band Fleetwood Mac. It first appeared on the 1977 album "Rumours" and was released as the B-side of the single "Dreams". It is one of four songs written solely by Christine McVie on the album. She would frequently sing the song at concerts. The song came to McVie as the band was finishing up a recording session at the Sausalito Record Plant. Producer Ken Caillat loved the track and suggested she record it alone in a concert style approach. Their first venue of choice, the Berkeley Community Theatre, was unavailable, so the band instead booked the Zellerbach Auditorium for March 3, 1976. To create the appropriate ambience, Caillat ordered a bouquet of flowers to place on her piano. He then requested three spotlights to illuminate the flowers from above. When McVie arrived at the auditorium, the house lights were dimmed so her attention was immediately brought to the illuminated flowers on the piano. In order to capture the optimal performance, 15 microphones were placed around the auditorium. The recording session went into the next morning due to the difficulty of recording the song live in one take. Lindsey Buckingham strummed an acoustic guitar offstage to keep the tempo. Eva Cassidy's version was released in 1998 on her posthumous compilation album of the same name "Songbird". Despite being released two years after her death from melanoma, the album eventually reached number 1 in the UK in 2001. "Songbird" finally charted in the UK in September 2009 at number 56, after a contestant (Shanna Goodhead) performed the song on "The X Factor". Willie Nelson covered "Songbird" on his own 2006 album "Songbird", making it the second album to be named after the song. The album peaked at #87 on the Billboard 200. John Frusciante covered "Songbird" at several Red Hot Chili Peppers concerts during 2007. New Zealand pop opera trio Sole Mio covered "Songbird" on their 2013 self-titled debut album.