About the Songwriters: The "Happy Birthday" song was written in the late nineteenth century by two sisters from Kentucky, Mildred J. Hill and Patty Smith Hill. Patty was a nursery school teacher, while Mildred was a composer and pianist.
About the Song: Mildred was the sister who came up with the simply eight-note melody for "Happy Birthday", after which sister Patty added the lyrics. Originally sung "Good Morning to You, Good Morning to You, Good Morning Dear Children, Good Morning to All", the song was written as a greeting to be sung to students each day. It is unclear as to when the lyrics were changed, but by 1924 the new version of the song had appeared in print.
About the Tab: "Happy Birthday" is a simple three chord song, written in "waltz time" (3/4 time). Strum each chord three times, with one exception (see tab for details). As the song is so short, you might want to repeat it several times. As finding a good key to sing "Happy Birthday" in can be tricky, tab has been provided for playing the song in both the key of D and the key of G.
Happy Birthday Tab and Lyrics
