Happy Birthday to You

Nursery rhyme
First published in 1893
Unknown originator

First verse:
Happy Birthday to You,
Falling down, falling down,
Happy Birthday to You,
My fair lady.

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Happy Birthday to You guitar tab and notes (pdf)

tabs tabs & notes

Listen

Happy Birthday to You instrumental guitar (mp3)

Happy Birthday to You - guitar tab, notes, chords and lyrics

“Happy Birthday to You” is recognized as the most common song in English that is singed at a birthday party, and is sometimes informally referred to as simply “Birthday Song”. The song is translated into many languages. It has been attributed to Patty and Mildred J. Hill, but is more likely composed by somebody else. The song is sometimes referred to the title “Good Morning to All”.

The music transcriptions of the song with tabs and notes are available for download as PDFs. It's free for personal use only.

Happy Birthday to You (full accompaniment)

"Happy Birthday to You" for guitar with full accompaniment. Free download in pdf-file and audio.

Happy Birthday to You guitar accompaniment

Happy Birthday to You (only melody)

“Happy Birthday to You” standard and tablature notation for guitar presented as an image.

Happy Birthday to You notes and tabs

Tips on how to learn this song

“Happy Birthday to You” is composed with the AABB structure: the first and second bars are similar with the third and fourth bars whereas the fifth and sixth bars are similar with the seventh and eighth bars. The melody in the version presented is played in open position and many notes are played with open strings which makes it easier.

Lyrics and chords

Happy Birthday to You chords in the key of C
Happy (C)birthday to (G)you,
Happy (G7)birthday to (C)you,
Happy birthday, dear (F)[name],
Happy (C)birthday to you.

The song includes only four chords, if both G and G7 are counted. The G - G7 change creates some extra tension before the progression resolves to the tonal center, C that is.

There are possibilities to change the key by using a capo, including these keys:

Key, time, tuning and tempo

Information about "Happy Birthday to You" considering musical key, time signature, tuning and bpm.

Key signature music symbol

Key

The presented version of Happy Birthday to You is played in the key of C.

Time signature music symbol

Time signature

The song is played in 3/4 tempo (counted one, two, three for each measure)

Tuning overview

Tuning

The song is normally played in standard tuning (EADGBE).

BPM symbol and numbers

Tempo (BPM)

The tempo in beats per minute is 100 for the presented version.