--- title: Bruce Springsteen Wrote a Song for 'Harry Potter' description: Bruce Springsteen penned a ballad called "I'll Stand by You Always" for the Harry Potter movies—but the song was ultimately rejected. canonical: https://time.com/4540388/bruce-springsteen-on-harry-potter/ author: Raisa Bruner article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-10-21T16:24:26.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:37:52.192Z og:title: Apparently Bruce Springsteen Wrote a Song for 'Harry Potter' og:description: He hopes he'll be able to find another children's movie to take the song. og:url: https://time.com/4540388/bruce-springsteen-on-harry-potter/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Apparently Bruce Springsteen Wrote a Song for 'Harry Potter' twitter:description: He hopes he'll be able to find another children's movie to take the song. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Apparently Bruce Springsteen Wrote a Song for _Harry Potter_ But They Didn't Use It  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Oct 21, 2016 4:24 PM UTC  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Oct 21, 2016 4:24 PM UTC Bruce Springsteen has accomplished a lot in his [decades-spanning rock ‘n’ roll career](http://content.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19751027,00.html) of [exemplifying Americana](http://time.com/4347386/bruce-springsteen-adele-coat/?iid=sr-link4), but there’s one thing he did not accomplish: featuring his music in the [_Harry Potter_ movies](http://time.com/4517021/harry-potter-movie-theaters/?iid=sr-link1). In a new interview with [BBC Radio 2’s Simon Mayo](http://bbc.in/2dQc0jn), Springsteen admitted that he had written a ballad for the magical wizarding movies… but the powers that be rejected the song, “I’ll Stand by You Always,” for some reason. “You’d have to ask them,” he told his interviewer about why his music was passed over. (It might be worth noting here that none of the eight _Potter_ films feature any lyrical tracks, instead sticking to the haunting orchestral score by [John Williams](http://time.com/4067746/star-wars-composer-john-william-receive-honor/?iid=sr-link1), Alexandre Desplat, and a few other composers throughout.) Calling his song a “big ballad,” Springsteen said he penned it for his eldest son, Evan, who’s now 26\. “It’s very uncharacteristic of something I’d sing myself, but it was something that I thought would have fit lovely \[in the films\],” he said. But not all hope is lost: “At some point I’d like to get it into a children’s movie of some sort. It was a pretty lovely song.” Looks like The Boss has another task on his to-do list. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4540388/bruce-springsteen-on-harry-potter/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4540388/bruce-springsteen-on-harry-potter/"},"headline":"Apparently Bruce Springsteen Wrote a Song for Harry Potter But They Didn't Use It","datePublished":"2016-10-21T16:24:26.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:37:52.192Z","description":"It never made it into the movies","url":"https://time.com/4540388/bruce-springsteen-on-harry-potter/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Entertainment","celebrities","Music"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Raisa Bruner","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4540388/bruce-springsteen-on-harry-potter/","name":"Apparently Bruce Springsteen Wrote a Song for Harry Potter But They Didn't Use It"}}]}] ```