Problem #1:
"Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to [spoken really fast] bill-and-john-and-mary-and-wendy,..."

Problem #2:
"Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to te-ed..."

The melody needs to be "stretchable" to accomodate a varying number of syllables. Perhaps we could just repeat the final two notes as many times as required, but I fear that would disturb the musical rhythm. Or perhaps the phrasing should be variable:

"Very happy birthday Ted" or
"Happy birthday to Daniel" or
"Happy birthday Christopher" or
"Best wishes John and Mary" etc.

Unfortunately the meter doesn't feel right in these examples. Better ideas?
-- egnor, Dec 27 2002

Happy birthday to Jane Happy Birthday to Jimmy Happy Birthday to Usef and a Happy birthday to Ted!

or if that won't work....

Happy birthday to you Happy birthday to you You look like a walrus and you smell like one too!
-- futurebird, Dec 27 2002


So you'd replace the "you"s with names? That would accomodate between one and four, as long as the names were one or two syllables each. Does anyone do this?
-- egnor, Dec 27 2002


A trio of singing female *pointer* dogs could handle this task quite nicely, without changing lyrics at all.
-- thumbwax, Dec 27 2002


just sing "for he's a jolly good fellow" instead?
-- yamahito, Dec 27 2002



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