Americans, far and away, sing that horrid little “Happy Birthday” ditty, which is actually copyrighted, unless they’re on TV or in a movie and don’t want to pay royalties, in which case they sing “For S/he’s a Jolly Good Fellow”.
Nava, in a birthday thread , “sings” what appears to this totally non-Spanish speaker to be a song rather inspired by “Happy Birthday” in Spanish. (Correct me if I’m wrong about this - the meter seems to work out, anyway.) Is this what they sing there, or was this just some fun for the benefit of the primarily English speaking Dope?
Our French teacher taught us some completely non - HB song in French class, but I forget what it was. And, of course, things you learn in class don’t always bear a lot of reality on current culture - she was an American living in France in the '80s.
So share your birthday songs with me! I’ll share the only one I know, which is in Neopagan English and shamelessly ripped off of HB:
Hmm…GQ or Cafe Society? Factual question or “creativity and entertainment”. I dunno. Move at will.
In Danish, they sing a song to the same tune we do, with the words “Tillykke til dig” instead (it isn’t pronounced the way it looks).
At church, the kids sing several different birthday songs for each other that aren’t based on the traditional song at all. They’re in the songbooks, and they’re mostly cute and fun.
Well, around here you have at least two translations of Happy Birthday: the “Joyeux anniversaire” one that’s mentioned in post 4 of gigi’s thread, and another one that goes:
Bonne fête [name],
Bonne fête [name],
Bonne fête, bonne fête,
Bonne fête [name].
A variant of the chorus of Gilles Vigneault’s song Gens du pays is also used (links to Wikipedia articles that explain how it is done). I believe the song was actually introduced to provide a song to sing at someone’s birthday that isn’t just a translation of a (still under copyright) American song.
Actually, it’s interesting, because the only part of Gens du pays I’ve ever heard was the chorus. It’s actually longer than that: here is the whole song, but I’ve never heard the verses.
In Quebec, we either use a French version of the Happy Birthday song:
Bonne fête à toi
Bonne fête à toi
Bonne fête, bonne fête
Bonne fête à toi
But we also have a Quebec-specific birthday song, which, oddly enough, is a modified version of the unofficial anthem of Quebec nationalists, “Gens du Pays”:
[Mon cher/Ma chère] [name],
C’est à ton tour
De te laisser parler d’amour
[repeats]
(“My dear [name], it’s your turn to let yourself talk of love.”)
Israel/Hebrew has its own words to “Happy Birthday”, plus a whole slew of “home-grown” songs (original lyrics and tune) – can’t reproduce the tunes here, and there’s probably little point in reproducing the lyrics…
Er is er een jarig hoera-hoera
Dat kun je wel zien dat is hij/zij.
Wij vinden het allen zo prettig ja-ja,
En daarom zingen wij blij:
Hij/Zij leve lang hoera-hoera,
Hij/Zij leve la-ang hoera.
“Today someone has a birthday, hurrah-hurrah,
It’s easy to see that it’s him/her [point at birthday person].
All of us think it’s really nice,
And that’s why we happily sing:
Long may he/she live, hurrah-hurrah,
Long may he/she live, hurrah.”
Sometimes combined with or substituted for the following:
*Lang zal die/ze leven,
Lang zal die/ze leven,
Lang zal die/ze leven in de gloria
In de glo-ri-a, in de glo-ri-a
Hiep-hiep-hiep hoera!
Hiep-hiep-hiep hoera!
*
“Long may he/she live in glory, hip hip hooray!” (I like the variant “hieperdepiep” better than “hiep-hiep-hiep”.)
Here in Panama, and elsewhere in the Spanish-speaking world, they sing a translated version of the English “Happy Birthday” song. The melody is exactly the same. At least here in Panama, it’s common to sing one verse each in English and Spanish.
severus, mentioned at the bottom of that link is the one my French teacher taught us. (“Bon anniversaire-Nos voeux les plus sincères…”) I still don’t remember the rest of the words - we mostly mumbled our way through them anyway! That one’s not actually used, huh?
It really is an adorable song, and it’s even better with the peppy little tune! I’m singing it right now but that doesn’t do you much good, so go to my link above and listen to the audio version. Even though the guy on the recording has about the worst singing voice in the world, you should get the idea.
Listen to the “Er is er een jarig” and “Lang zal die leven” songs one right after the other, as that’s the way the Dutch usually sing them. Hieperdepiep-hoera!
In Venezuela they sing a translated version of “Happy Birthday to you”. Before that, though, they sing “ay, que noche tan preciosa” (oh, what a beautiful night). The song has a bunch of alternative mock lyrics and singing it always end in chaos. It is fun.
That is incorrect! It goes like this:
Happy Birthday to you / you live in the zoo / you look like a monkey / you smell like one too!
In the thread you quoted someone mentions the beginning of this French version that I’ve heard in Switzerland (and is probably also used in other French-speaking countries):
Hoyeux anniversaire / Nos voeux les plus sincères / Que ces quelques fleurs / Vous apportent le bonheur / Que l’année entière / Vous soit douce et légère / Et que l’an fini / Nous soyons tous réunis / Pour chanter en chœur / Bon anniversaire
This last one is a bit puzzling in Swedish, since the verb is commonly rendered as har (have) which hints that the sentence is not in imperative mood; hence it’s missing a pronoun. It is probably short for “[We] have the honour [of extending our congratulations]”. At other times it is ha which do indicate imperative mood (an order) - perhaps a case of hypercorrection.
