It Is The Birthday Of The “Happy Birthday Song”!

Pulse

oi-Anjana NS

By Anjana Ns

Monday, June 27, 2011, 11:39

If there was one song that is universally accepted and sung almost everyday then it is the “Happy Birthday Day Song", the four verse short classic, was written today!

According to the history, two sisters Mildred J.Hill and Patty Smith Hill came up with the happy birthday song. The melody and lyrics were written by the sisters and was one of the many other songs in the famous “Song Stories For The Kindergarten" book published in 1893.

Patty was a schoolteacher and Mildred was a composer, organist and pianist. Surprisingly, the melody was not actually developed for the birthday song. It was originally for a classroom greeting song called" Good Morning To All".

Although the change of melody from good morning to happy birthday song is still not clear, Jessica Hill, another Hill sister copyrighted and published the song in 1930 under Clayton F. Summy Company, a publishing group.

Clayton F. Summy Company was later bought by John F. Sengstack and renamed it Birch Tree Ltd. In 1998, Birch Tree Ltd was also bought by Warner Chappell and is currently known as Summy-Birchard Music.

It is said that the happy birthday song fetches $2 million every year in royalties with half going to the company and the other half to the Hill Foundation.

And even till this day, none of the other happy birthday songs have been able to reach the popularity of this masterpiece. So lets ' make a tribute to the two sisters by singing the birthday of the “Happy Birthday Song".