No Valid Copyright Claim on 'Happy Birthday' Song, U.S. District Judge Rules
Warner/Chappell Music and other companies that have claimed copyright since 1935 on the “Happy Birthday” song have never actually held a valid claim, U.S. District Judge George King ruled late Tuesday in Los Angeles. Filmmaker Jennifer Nelson and other plaintiffs…
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had jointly challenged Warner/Chappell's copyright of the song in 2013 after the company sought royalties for all performances of the song for commercial purposes. Warner/Chappell had charged Nelson $1,500 for a synchronization license to use “Happy Birthday” in a documentary about the song. Warner/Chappell has claimed copyright on “Happy Birthday” since 1988, following its purchase of the Beech Tree Group, successor to original copyright claimant Clayton F. Summy Co. Summy bought the rights to “Good Morning to You” from original composers Mildred Hill and Patty Smith Hill. The original 1935 copyright claim that Summy filed in 1935 pertains only to certain piano arrangements of “Happy Birthday's” music, originally titled “Good Morning to You,” rather than the general song's melody or its lyrics, King said in his ruling. There's “no one, really, who can claim an ownership” to the “Happy Birthday” song since Mildred Hill and Patty Smith Hill “didn't convey the rights to Summy Co.,” King said, noting that it's unclear whether the Hill sisters still held common-law copyright over the lyrics by the time they sold the rights to Summy in 1893. The alternative “Happy Birthday” lyrics to “Good Morning to You” appeared in songbooks only beginning in 1911, when those lyrics appeared without an authorship credit. “A reasonable fact finder could also find that the Happy Birthday lyrics were written by someone else” and that Patty Smith Hill's claim to authorship of the alternative lyrics “was a post hoc attempt to take credit for the words that had long since become more famous and popular than the ones she wrote for the classic melody,” King said. Nelson and other plaintiffs have sought restitution of all licensing fees that Warner/Chappell has collected for use of “Happy Birthday” since 1988, though a spokesman for the plaintiffs said that issue will be resolved later. Warner/Chappell said it's “looking at the court's lengthy opinion and considering our options.”