origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?

Subject: if you're happy and you know it
From:
Date: 22 Apr 00 - 04:47 AM

Hi - I'm new to the forum and am in desparate need of help. I need to find out FAST if the folk song "If You're Happy and You Know It (Clap Your Hands)" is in the public domain. Many thanks for any help offered!

Subject: RE: Help: if you're happy and you know it
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Apr 00 - 05:04 AM

Hi- I think you're pretty safe in calling it "traditional." It's called "traditional" in one Girl Scout songbook I found, and it's unattributed in my Cub Scout Songbook.
-Joe Offer (e-mail sent)-

Subject: RE: Help: if you're happy and you know it
From:
Date: 22 Apr 00 - 05:17 AM

Thanks, Joe!

Subject: RE: Help: if you're happy and you know it
From: Eluned
Date: 22 Apr 00 - 11:49 PM

So, what purpose did you need this info for? (I'm a nosy lady; you don't HAVE to answer that question!)

Subject: RE: Help: if you're happy and you know it
From: lloyd64
Date: 23 Apr 00 - 01:48 AM

Elunde....

Thanks for asking the question, I was wondering the same thing. Maybe because it came from a GUEST. Not to long ago I was a GUEST, I lost my cookie, but now I'm back in the fold, cookie and all.

If you are a GUEST and you know it log your cookie
If you are a GUEST and you know it log your cookie
If you are a GUEST and you know it then your blue name will show it
If you are a GUEST and you know it log your cookie

lloyd62

Subject: RE: Help: if you're happy and you know it
From: catspaw49
Date: 23 Apr 00 - 02:07 AM

If you're happy and you know it, why do you need help? I submit that you are not as happy as may appear and you need to own up that fact now. Life will be easier I assure you. If you need any further help, let us know and remember that the truth is good unless you have just robbed a bank and are being questioned by police. In this case, an artfully prepared lie is the path to happiness.

Spaw

Subject: RE: Help: if you're happy and you know it
From: Mo the caller
Date: 18 May 10 - 08:49 AM

I too am interested about the origins of this song, since it lends itself to a dance, which can get everyone onto the floor without needing a partner, if you have mixed ages.
My songbook 'Apuskiduski' calls it 'American traditional'. I wasn't know to me as a child ('40s), but all my children sang it in Playgroup. So I would say it's trad. over here too, now.

My dance version starts in a circle, holding hands (except when doing the 'action'). Sing.
All to the middle...Clap/Stamp/Nod/Shout
All out...Clap/Stamp/Nod/Shout
Circle left...Clap/Stamp/Nod/Shout

So how old is it? When do you first remember singing/hearing it.

I did try searching, but got alot of parodies (which may itself show how widespread and traditional it is).

Subject: RE: Help: if you're happy and you know it
From: Mo the caller
Date: 19 May 10 - 07:03 AM

origins anyone?

Subject: origin - If You're Happy. How old?
From: Mo the caller
Date: 05 Jun 10 - 09:22 AM

When did you first hear the song 'If You're Happy and you Know It'?
I didn't meet it untill my children were at Playgroup, and I have it in a book published in 1975 as 'traditional American'.
When did it come over here, and does anyone know how old it really is?

Subject: RE: origin - If You're Happy. How old?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 05 Jun 10 - 12:51 PM

1956

Subject: RE: origin - If You're Happy. How old?
From: Little Robyn
Date: 05 Jun 10 - 06:50 PM

At least.
It's the type of thing we sang at Sunday school in the early/mid 50s.
Robyn

Subject: RE: origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 05 Jun 10 - 07:14 PM

I found it in the 1962 Cooperative Recreation Service songbook, Tent and Trail Songs. No attribution in that book for this particular song.
It's also in the 1963 Boy Scout Songbook.
Leeneia, where did you get your 1956 date?
the song has a Wikipedia Page, but it's inconclusive. The page has an undocumented claim that the song "stems from an old Latvian folk song."
-Joe-

Subject: RE: origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?
From: Mo the caller
Date: 06 Jun 10 - 08:15 AM

Thanks.
It has the same tune as "put your finger on your nose", which I have a feeling is a Woody Guthrie song. But I may be wrong, and I don't know if he wrote it, just sang it or used the tune from a trad. American song.

Subject: RE: origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 06 Jun 10 - 08:30 AM

I always heard it sung to the tune of 'she'll be coming round the mountain.'

Subject: RE: origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?
From: MickyMan
Date: 06 Jun 10 - 08:40 AM

I believe that it is different from both those songs mentioned. Similar, but still noticeably unique.

Subject: RE: origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 29 Jul 21 - 06:48 AM

For the melody only. Wouldn't surprise me to learn Krauss wrote the lyrics in 1957.

How Do You Do? Billy Jones & Ernest Hare, 1924 (Flemimg, Harrison, DeVoll, 1924)
The Happiness Boys

Also: RE: ADD/Origins: sea song: 'The Fall Guy' (1925)

Subject: RE: origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?
From: GUEST,#
Date: 29 Jul 21 - 01:59 PM

https://hymnary.org/hymn/PCSS1916/page/309

I think the melody is the same as at least one of the IYHAYKCYH songs. The copyright date is 1914. However . . .

Subject: RE: origin: If You're Happy and You Know It- How old?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 30 Jul 21 - 03:37 PM

I think the pretty universal tune 'Three Cheers for the Red, White and Blue' used for multiple forces tunes going back to the early 19th century may be the precurser of all of these. One of Henry Russell's?