Minnie Riperton - Loving You

"Lovin' You" is a 1975 hit single by Minnie Riperton. The song became the 400th No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 on April 5, 1975. Additionally, the song reached No. 2 in the UK, and No. 3 on the R&B charts in the US. The song is especially noteworthy due to the unusually high pitches that Riperton reaches during the song. It's also noteworthy for the sound of the chirping songbirds that are heard throughout the song, which Riperton phonates by use of the whistle register.

It was the fourth single from the album Perfect Angel (1974). The song is notable for Riperton's use of the whistle register.

"Lovin' You" was among the first several songs to top the U.S. pop chart without the help of a percussion instrument. Prior examples of percussion-less Number Ones were Jim Croce – "Time in a Bottle" (1973), The Beatles – "Yesterday" (1965), and on the UK Singles Chart, The Beatles – "Eleanor Rigby" (1966).
According to the liner notes from Riperton's compilation CD Petals, the melody for "Lovin' You" was created as a distraction for her daughter (Maya Rudolph) when she was a baby so that Minnie and her husband Richard could hang out. Maya was in the studio with her mother on the day the song was recorded and Riperton can be heard singing her daughter's name at the end of the song, but only in the unedited or album version of the song. The song fades out early in the single edit, because the disc jockeys felt that the repeated "MAYA" was being overdone and too misunderstood, thinking that it was a "Mayan Chant".