Following Christmas 1963, Cooke invited J.W. Alexander to his home to preview a new song he had just written, one Cooke was very excited about. When he arrived, Cooke ran through the number on his guitar twice, the second time going over it line by line. Both were very excited to record the song, with Alexander viewing it as more personal and political than anything he had yet attempted. He warned Cooke that he may not profit off the song as he had with lighter, poppier songs, but Cooke did not care. He explained to Alexander that he hoped the song would make his father proud. "It was less work than any song he'd ever written," biographer Peter Guralnick says. "It almost scared him that the song — it was almost as if the song were intended for somebody else. He grabbed it out of the air and it came to him whole, despite the fact that in many ways it's probably the most complex song that he wrote. It was both singular — in the sense that you started out, 'I was born by the river' — but it also told the story both of a generation and of a people."