Songfacts®:

• Written by '70s hitmaker Paul Williams, this gospel-tinged song about finding peace in the midst of grief was introduced in the 1977 Jim Henson TV special Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas. The story, based on Russell and Lillian Hoban's 1971 children's book of the same name, follows a family of otters who fall on hard times after the death of their patriarch. Emmet Otter (Jerry Nelson) and his mother, Alice Otter (Marilyn Sokol), sing the tune while reminiscing about the late Pa Otter at Christmas time. The Otters take comfort in the idea that death is not an ending but a natural part of the circle of life, calling to mind Pa's favorite hymn "Downstream Where The River Meets The Sea." The music and lyrics aren't mentioned in the book, but the song's title inspired Williams to write his own version with his own father's words in mind.
  
  "When you think about death, the line that comes to mind, I don't know if my dad said it or if I thought it and gave him credit for it, but I've always said that my dad said, 'The greatest tribute to the mind of man was that we had conceived of infinity and our own death and had not gone mad,'" Williams recalled in a 2021 American Songwriter interview. "What is the antidote to that madness or that fear is a sense of comfort. This is nature at its best because it gives us the thought of a life that continues. When the river meets the sea, the water doesn't stop being water. It becomes a larger body of water. That's my own consciousness. I seem to write about lives continuing and multiple lives a lot."
• Williams spent the early part of the '70s writing pop-rock hits for the likes of Three Dog Night and the Carpenters, so he was surprised when Henson enlisted him to write a batch of Americana-influenced songs for Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas.
  
  "I had no real background in Americana - I wasn't somebody that followed that kind of music. I mean, I liked Hank Williams and traditional country and the like, but none of these songs were right down the pike for me," Williams told Yahoo Music in 2018.
  
  But something about the poignant story of a poverty-stricken family of woodland creatures and their struggle to create a special Christmas struck a chord with the songwriter.
  
  "Those were the easiest songs I think I've ever written in my life. They poured out of me. I don't think I ever had songs come out of me so quickly for a project. They sprang forth. At some point, you give yourself to the emotion that the story inspires, and sometimes you get really lucky."
• Williams suspected the Emmet Otter gig was a test to see if he'd be the right fit for another Henson project that was in the works: The Muppet Movie. If it was, he must have passed with flying colors, because he teamed up with Kenneth Ascher to write the music and lyrics for the 1979 film, including the Oscar-nominated tune "Rainbow Connection."
• The song was revived for the 1979 holiday special - and its accompanying soundtrack album - John Denver And The Muppets: A Christmas Together. The "Rocky Mountain High" singer became close friends with Jim Henson after guest-starring on The Muppet Show earlier that year. For his reunion with Kermit the Frog and the gang, Denver helps them put together the Christmas program, which includes a performance of "When The River Meets The Sea." As Robin the Frog, Jerry Nelson's vocals open the track, accompanied by a simple keyboard arrangement, before Denver joins in on a crest of instrumentation that includes strings, flutes, and electric and acoustic guitars.
  
  The album boasts a number of prominent guest musicians, including Wrecking Crew veterans Hal Blaine on drums/percussion and Jim Horn on various flutes and sax, as well as bluegrass legend Herb Pedersen on guitars and banjo.
• At Henson's request, this was performed at his memorial service at Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in New York City on May 21, 1990. It was sung by Jerry Nelson and fellow Muppet Show voice actor Louise Gold.
• Emmet Otter didn't get an official soundtrack release until 2018, more than 40 years after the special's debut. Williams understood why fans wanted the songs, but he didn't know if the record label could pull it off with the original tracks.
  
  "By the time that actually happened, what they essentially had was the guide tracks for the Muppeteers - a mix with the vocal way, way out in front of the tracks so they could properly lip sync their characters to the songs," he told The AV Club in 2018. "And what amazed me is just the work that was done to pull a balanced, really sweetly listenable representation of the songs. It sounds like they jumped into the masters or the original eight-track and remixed it. When I first heard [the original audio], I thought, 'How are they going to do this?' And by god they did it."
• "When The River Meets The Sea" earned Paul Williams an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Individual Achievement - Children's Programming in 1981.
• Folk-rock singer Matt Nathanson recorded this for his 2020 album, Farewell December.