GOOD MORNING TO ALL
Created on 28/02/2003Latest update on 17/12/2023
Artist: Mildred Hill & Patty Smith Hill
Author: Mildred Hill/Patty Smith Hill
Year: 1893
Mildred, who taught and played organ, wrote the music. Her sister Patty, who was head of the Louisville Experimental Kindergarten School in Kentucky, wrote the lyrics to this children's song to be sung in class, first thing in the morning. And on birthdays, a special chorus was added spontaneously. Published in songbook Song Stories For The Kindergarten in 1893, the same year their schooling method was rewarded at the Chicago World Fair.
Covers:
- 1924:
Robert H. Coleman [as Happy Birthday To You, later in Broadway musical The Band Wagon ('31) and in Broadway musical As Thousands Cheer by Irving Berlin ('33)]
- 1927:
Dmitri Shostakovich [as trumpet solo in his Symphony n° 2 (To October) to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the October revolution]
- 1933:
Lucille Lipps [for Western Union's first wired song, adressed to Rudy Vallee]
- 1934:
Shirley Temple [in her first film Baby, Take A Bow]
- 1938:
Jimmy & The Bandits [in film Little Miss Broadway]
- 1939:
Judy Garland [in '41 in film Life Begins For Andy Hardy]
- 1940:
- 1946:
Jane Powell & Walter Pidgeon [in film Holiday In Mexico]
- 1951:
Mario Lanza [in film The Great Caruso]
- 1953:
- 1955:
Igor Stravinsky [in Greetings Prelude]
- 1961:
Shadows [for Cliff on album 21 Today]
- 1962:
Marilyn Monroe [at Madison Square Garden for JFK's 45th birthday]
- 1963:
Beatles [as Happy Birthday Saturday Club (BBC)]
- 1968:
- 1968:
Idle Race [with Jeff Lynne on lp Birthday Party]
- 1977:
- 1989:
- 1990s:
Kiri Te Kanawa [all as Happy Birthday To You]
- 1998:
Geri Halliwell [at Prince Charles' 50th birthday party]
- 2003:
Capt. Beefheart [as Happy Earth Day; telephoned 35 seconds version for charity album Where We Live]
A third sister, Jessica Hill, no longer endured the uncrediting use of the Hill-melody and sued all these Happy Birthday profits successfully in 1935. Made for a 2 million dollar royalty cheque each year. In '88 the Hill family sold the rights on Happy Birthday To You to Warner Brothers for $25 million. According to the Guinness Book Of World Records, Happy Birthday To You is one of the most popular pieces of music in English, in league with Auld Lang Syne and For He's A Jolly Good Fellow.
