Songfacts®:

• Written by John Barlow Jarvis, this romantic duet between Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton takes place early on a Christmas morning, as the couple enjoys the quiet space between the previous evening's festivities and the arrival of Santa Claus. Although a tree stands in the corner and presents wait to be unwrapped, they each realize they've already received the greatest gift of all - their love for each other.
  
  Featured on the collaborative album Once Upon A Christmas, the single peaked at #81 on the Hot 100, #40 on the Adult Contemporary chart, and #53 on the Country chart.
• Jarvis is a session pianist on a number of country albums, and he tours with Vince Gill's band. He also co-wrote Gill's "I Still Believe in You" and The Judds' "Love Can Build a Bridge."
• When Rogers was planning a second Christmas album (following 1981's Christmas), he called on Dolly Parton, his partner on the hit 1983 duet "Islands In The Stream."
  
  In a 1984 Cash Box interview, Rogers explained why he came back for both Christmas and Dolly. "I was raised in a Baptist family and I've always thought of Christmas as a special time, a time when families who might be apart the rest of the year can come close together again," he said. "Something special also happens when Dolly and I get together: It's a case of the whole being even greater than the sum of its parts."
• Surprisingly, Parton had never recorded a Christmas album before joining Rogers for Once Upon A Christmas. "This is the first Christmas special or album that I've ever done," she confirmed to Cash Box.
  
  "So when Kenny called me with the idea, I jumped at it. Kenny and I love singing together - I think the blend of our voices creates a real electricity that comes across on record. He also has a real Santa Claus spirit. He makes working fun, and approaches things like I do, enjoying the people around him."
• Before they officially agreed to collaborate on the album, Rogers and Parton had to come to an understanding about their roles on the project. Rogers wanted to produce the release with David Foster, while Parton wanted to include some of her own songs on the tracklist.
  
  "We struck this arrangement that if her songs were up to the quality of the rest of the songs on the project, then we could do them," Rogers recalled in the liner notes to his 1998 compilation, Through The Years: A Retrospective, "and if my production was up to the rest of the production, then I could do that."
• Rogers and Parton performed this on their CBS TV special Kenny & Dolly: A Christmas To Remember in 1984. The program was directed by Bob Giraldi, who wrote and directed Michael Jackson's popular "Beat It" video the previous year.
• The album peaked at #12 on the Country Albums chart and crossed over to the all-genre Billboard 200 at #31. It also went to #31 in Canada, where it earned the Canadian Country Music Association Award for Top Selling Album in 1985.
• In 1997, the album was reissued with an alternate tracklist that omitted Rogers' solo renditions of "Silent Night" and "The Christmas Song" in favor of Parton's 1982 recording of her Best Little Whorehouse In Texas classic "Hard Candy Christmas."