Rhiannon (song)
1976 song by Fleetwood Mac
"Rhiannon" (also released as a single under the title "Rhiannon (Will You Ever Win)") is a song written by Stevie Nicks and originally recorded by the British-American rock band Fleetwood Mac for their eponymous 1975 album, then issued as a single the following year. The song peaked on U.S. charts at no. 11 in June 1976. The song peaked at no. 46 in the UK singles chart for three weeks after re-release in February 1978.
"Rhiannon" was voted no. 488 in The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time by Rolling Stone magazine. They also ranked the song number six on their list of the 50 greatest Fleetwood Mac songs.
When Nicks performed the song live, she often introduced it as "a song about an old Welsh witch." During 1975–1982, Fleetwood Mac's live performances of "Rhiannon" took on a theatrical intensity not present on the FM-radio single. The song built to a climax in which Nicks's vocals were so impassioned that, as drummer and band co-founder Mick Fleetwood recalled, "her Rhiannon in those days was like an exorcism."
Composition and recording
Nicks wrote "Rhiannon" after reading the novel Triad by Mary Bartlet Leader.
The public source identifies “Rhiannon (song)” as 1976 song by Fleetwood Mac. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Rhiannon, song and Fleetwood.
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Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q959036. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1975, 1976, 1978 and 1982.
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This entry incorporates text from “Rhiannon (song)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.