Actually, the evidence indicates that Happy Birthday is not under copyright.


Edit: Correction to above: I meant to write "should not be under copyright". I should not have written that I disputed that it has a copyright, but instead that copyright should never have been assigned. blush


The main reason that "Happy Birthday" still gets royalties is that it's cheaper to pay the royalties than contest it.

The melody is from the 1893 song "Good Morning To You" (now in public domain).

The lyric was grafted from a pre-existing version of "Happy Birthday". It appears that grafting the two may have been done by the author's students.

In fact, "Happy Birthday To You" was published (not by the authors) in 1912 with instructions to sing the song to the tune of "Good Morning To You" with these alternate lyrics.

Then in 1935, a company claimed "Happy Birthday To You" was their own work - over 20 years after it had been published in that form.

They'd been profiting from it ever since.

Last edited by dcuny; 06/06/14 10:08 AM.
-- David Cuny
My virtual singer development blog

Vocal control, you say. Never heard of it. Is that some kind of ProTools thing?