No copyright to ‘Happy Birthday’ lyrics, judge rules
A US judge has ruled that the lyrics to “Happy Birthday to You” are not protected by copyright, finding against music publisher Warner/Chappell.
In a ruling handed down at the US District Court for the Central District of California, Judge George King said copyright had applied to the melody and certain piano arrangements but never to the lyrics.
The ruling, from yesterday, September 22, is the culmination of a two-year class action lawsuit centring on the song and who, if anyone, owns the copyright attached to its lyrics.
The case started in 2013 when documentary maker Good Morning to You Productions sued Warner/Chappell. Good Morning to You was forced to pay Warner/Chappell $1,500 to play the song in a documentary that it had made earlier that year covering the history of the track.
In its complaint, Good Morning to You claimed that Warner/Chappell had collected “millions of dollars” in licensing fees for the song even though its origins are disputed.
The song was originally composed by Kentucky-based sisters Mildred and Patty Hill in 1893 under the name “Good Morning to All”.
A manuscript, which included a melody to match the popular words from that song to the now famous tune, was assigned to music publisher Clayton Summy and his company Clayton F Summy Company in exchange for a cut of the sales.
However, it was not until 1911 that the birthday-related lyrics started being used in the song.
The first copyrighted version of “Happy Birthday” was published by Summy’s company in 1935.
Warner/Chappell bought Summy’s company in 1998 and has maintained ever since that it assumed the song’s copyright dating to 1935.
But in yesterday’s judgment, King claimed that copyright does not apply to the lyrics.
“Defendants ask us to find that the Hill sisters eventually gave Summy Co the rights in the lyrics to exploit and protect, but this assertion has no support in the record.
“The Hill sisters gave Summy Co the rights to the melody and the rights to piano arrangements based on the melody but never the rights to any lyrics,” she said.
“Because Summy Co never acquired the rights to the ‘Happy Birthday’ lyrics, defendants … do not own a valid copyright in the ‘Happy Birthday’ lyrics,” she added.
The case has seen several twists and turns.
In July this year, WIPR reported that Warner/Chappell had been dealt a blow after presenting lawyers representing Good Morning to You with previously withheld material that was “mistakenly” not produced during the discovery period of the trial, which ended in July 2014.
Included in the documents was the 15th edition of a book called “The Everyday Song Book”, published in 1927 and which contained the lyrics to “Happy Birthday”.
Lawyers representing the documentary maker then found an even earlier edition of the book published in 1922 in archives belonging to The University of Pittsburgh.
This edition did not include a copyright notice. Instead it included a line underneath that said “special permission” had been granted to use the song’s lyrics from Summy.
The songbook, according to Good Morning to You, proved that the “Happy Birthday” lyrics were in the public domain many years before 1922.
