About The Song
In 1958, Nashville songwriter and producer Bob Ferguson had just wrapped a long stretch of work for the Tennessee Game and Fish Commission. He had finished thirteen wildlife films and felt a quiet rush of relief and gratitude. Sitting with that feeling, he wrote a song that mixed simple faith with the image of a dove. He called it “Wings of a Dove.” The title nodded to a line in the Psalms about wings like a dove; the story itself reached back to the flood in Genesis, when Noah sent out a bird to see whether the waters had begun to fall.
Two years later the song found its voice. On May 24, 1960, Ferlin Husky stepped into Bradley Studios in Nashville and recorded it under the guidance of producer Ken Nelson. Capitol released the single in July, backed with “Next to Jimmy.” It became the title track of Husky’s album of the same name. What happened next surprised almost everyone. The record climbed to the top of the Billboard country chart and stayed there for ten nonconsecutive weeks. It remained on the country list for roughly nine months. At the same time it crossed over to the pop side, peaking at number 12 on the Hot 100. It was Husky’s third and final number-one country hit.
The song itself is straightforward and comforting. When troubles press in and the spirit grows numb, the singer says, God does not forget. He sends pure, sweet love as a sign from above, carried on the wings of a snow-white dove. One verse retells Noah’s long drift on the flood waters, searching for land in every way he could. Even then the bird returned with a message of hope. The refrain circles back again and again: love arrives on those wings.
Ferguson later described the song as a personal expression of faith and the joy of finishing a hard job. He went on to write other country hits, including “The Carroll County Accident” for Porter Wagoner, but “Wings of a Dove” remained the one that traveled farthest. In 1987 Broadcast Music Incorporated presented him with a “Million Air” award for the song’s airplay.
Over the decades the record became a quiet standard. George Jones recorded it, as did Charley Pride. Dolly Parton cut it more than once, once adding a verse about the Spirit descending like a dove at Jesus’ baptism. Loretta Lynn, Ricky Skaggs, and others took it up as well. Actor Robert Duvall even sang it in the 1983 film Tender Mercies, the performance sitting easily inside the story of a washed-up country singer finding his way again.
What has kept the song alive is its plain promise. In a style that never raises its voice, it offers the oldest kind of reassurance: when the water rises and the body grows weak, something gentle still arrives from above. That message, written after a day’s work on wildlife films and sung once in a Nashville studio in the spring of 1960, has been carried on the airwaves ever since.
Video
Lyric
On the wings of a snow-white dove
He sends His pure sweet love
A sign from above (sign from above)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
When troubles surround us
When evils come
The body grows weak (body grows weak)
The spirit grows numb (spirit grows numb)
When these things beset us
He doesn’t forget us
He sends down His love (sends down His love)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
On the wings of a snow-white dove
He sends His pure sweet love
A sign from above (sign from above)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
When noah had drifted
On the flood many days
He searched for land (he searched for land)
In various ways (various ways)
Troubles, he had some
But wasn’t forgotten
He sent him His love (sent him His love)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
On the wings of a snow-white dove
He sends His pure sweet love
A sign from above (sign from above)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
On the wings of a snow-white dove
He sends His pure sweet love
A sign from above (sign from above)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)
On the wings of a dove (wings of a dove)