The Doors' 1967 signature track 'Light My Fire' owes a hidden debt to John Coltrane's 1961 jazz recording of 'My Favourite Things', according to accounts from the band's own members. While Robby Krieger wrote the original melody, drawing on 'Hey Joe' and the Rolling Stones' 'Play with Fire', it was keyboardist Ray Manzarek's love of jazz that shaped the song's famous extended solo, which shares its chord progression with Coltrane's reinvention of the Rodgers and Hammerstein show tune.

Manzarek had been captivated by Coltrane's 13-minute version years before forming the band in Los Angeles, and drummer John Densmore, also a jazz devotee who had seen Coltrane and Miles Davis live, pushed to bring that genre's improvisational freedom into rock. The band reworked Coltrane's 3/4 time signature into a 4/4 groove, blending Krieger's flamenco influences and Jim Morrison's beatnik and symbolist poetry leanings, with Manzarek recalling long, freewheeling solo sessions during recording. The song went on to define The Doors' sound after its 1967 release.