Ten Things You Need To Know About ‘Happy Birthday’
To celebrate my littlest little one’s birthday this week I thought I’d read up on the song ‘Happy Birthday’ and share some of the facts and videos I found. I hope you find them interesting!
1. The traditional melody for ‘Happy Birthday’ is believed to have been taken from the song ‘Good Morning To All’ which was published in 1893 by sisters Patty and Mildred J. Hill. Some say that the melody was probably taken from, or at least inspired by, other traditional tunes of the time.
2. In 1935 the publisher Summy Company registered the copyright for various piano arrangements of ‘Happy Birthday to You’.
3. After acquiring the company which owned the copyright for ‘Happy Birthday to You’ Warner/Chappell Music earned around US$5000 per day in royalties as they claimed copyright for every performance of the song in film, TV, in public and where there was a large audience of mostly non-friends of the performer. It could cost up to US$10000 for the song to appear in full in a film!
4. Marilyn Monroe performed ‘Happy Birthday’ for U.S. President John F. Kennedy in May 1962. Her breathy performance is probably one of the best known performances of the song. https://youtu.be/EqolSvoWNck
5. The earliest known publication of the song ‘Happy Birthday’ uses the name John in the lyrics.
6. The traditional lyrics to ‘Happy Birthday’ has been translated into at least 18 different languages.
7. NASA programmed the Sample Analysis on Mars machine on the Curiosity rover to play ‘Happy Birthday’ on 5th August 2013, one year after it began its mission on Mars. They used the different vibration frequencies of the instrument to hit the different notes. https://youtu.be/uxVVgBAosqg
8. There are lots of other Happy Birthday songs, in lots of different languages. This catchy, foot-tapping song in Hindi is one of my favourites! https://youtu.be/Vyzg_Ws3aqQ
9. Cody Martin passed his American Idol audition with a soulful rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ which he sang to Katy Perry on her birthday. https://youtu.be/ViYdhgny2_A
10. ‘Happy Birthday’ doesn’t need to be translated into different languages to be translated into different cultures. I absolutely adore this group of people from Botswana singing their version of ‘Happy Birthday’. https://youtu.be/51r9uJgZhxI
I hope someone sings ‘Happy Birthday’ very loudly to you for your next birthday!