Music icon Elton John was reduced to tears for 45 minutes while recording his new album, as he grappled with the fear of mortality. The 77-year-old legend was performing a new track titled When This Old World Is Done With Me, and confessed that the lyrics penned by Bernie Taupin resonated deeply with him, prompting thoughts about his own mortality. The song is the final track on his upcoming album Who Believes In Angels? which he recorded with Brandi Carlile and is set to be released on April 4.

Sir Elton shared: "I wrote a song at the end of the album and I just get the lyrics, Bernie Taupin's lyrics called When This Old World Is Done With Me. And so I'm writing the verse, like, 'Oh, this is really pretty.' And then I get to the chorus and of course it's about my death. And when you get to my age, which is near 100, you think, 'How much time have I got left?' And you've got children, you've got a wonderful husband, you just think about mortality. And so when I got to the chorus, I just broke down for 45 minutes and it's all on film." The album was co-created with Brandi Carlile, who revealed that Elton "he cried hard". She added: "I want everybody to see it because it's really human, like deeply flawed and embarrassing. And the kind of stuff that you do when you forget that there is a camera on is what's really interesting,",reports the Mirror.

"He got to the end of that chorus and his voice started to shake and I thought, 'Oh, he's going, like he's going to really go'. And he went into a real moment."

During a heartfelt conversation on the Smartless podcast, Sir Elton John made it clear that he never envisioned himself as a solo artist and explained his unexpected rise to fame.

He said: "I never imagined myself as a solo artist. When I was in my group, Bluesology, I took the big risk of going up to Liberty Records saying, 'I want to write songs, I'm so fed up with playing in a band that doesn't want to go anywhere, and I can sing too.'"

"And so the guy, as you know, because it's an old story, gave me the envelope with Bernie (Taupin)'s lyrics in it. And then when we wrote songs, I had to go out and nothing was happening. I had to go out and play them live. So I had to form a band.

"And I really didn't have any visions of being Elton John, superstar. It just happened very, very quickly.

"But it was like, I was a kid in a candy store. I never realised, never really visualised Elton John being a big star. It all happened by accident, really. It really happened by accident, which was lovely."

The iconic musician, whose career now spans over six decades, boasts 10 UK Number 1 singles and 9 Number 1 albums.

Yet, despite his astronomical success, Sir Elton has decided that his Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour will be his last, having wrapped up in Stockholm in July 2023 after an epic run of 330 concerts across the globe, so he can focus on his family.

The music legend also appeared in a documentary last October, Elton John: Never Too Late, where he openly discussed his own mortality, saying: "I wonder what is going to happen to all of this stuff when I finish? This is the latter time of my life. I don't know how much time I have left."