"Oh Happy Day" was a 1952 surprise hit song, one of the first whose initial popularity was driven by teenagers rather than support from the music industry. The song was originally recorded and copyrighted by Don Howard, a high school student who had learned the song secondhand; the song's originator, Nancy Binns Reed, heard the song and within weeks of its release sued to claim songwriter credit. Reed and Howard eventually settled, with each receiving co-writer credits. Concurrently with Howard's original acoustic pop recording, concurrent

cover version In popular music, a cover version, cover song, remake, revival, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording by a musician other than the original performer or composer of the song. Originally, it referred to a version of a song release ...

s by two established acts, the

Lawrence Welk Lawrence Welk (March 11, 1903 – May 17, 1992) was an American accordionist, bandleader, and television impresario, who hosted the '' The Lawrence Welk Show'' from 1951 to 1982. His style came to be known as "champagne music" to his radio, te ...

Orchestra (whose version featured a now-famous ''

basso profondo Basso profondo (Italian: "deep bass"), sometimes basso profundo, contrabass or oktavist, is the lowest bass voice type. While ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'' defines a typical bass as having a range that is limited to the second E below ...

'' lead vocal by

Larry Hooper Lawrence "Bullfrog" Hooper (July 22, 1917 in Independence, Missouri – June 10, 1983 in Los Angeles, California) was an American musician and vocalist. He was best known to television audiences as part of ''The Lawrence Welk Show'' as a featured ...

) and

the Four Knights The Four Knights were an American vocal group from Charlotte, North Carolina, United States. Their 1954 hit, "I Get So Lonely When I Dream About You (Oh Baby Mine)", sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc. Career The group was f ...

, were also released; for a time in 1953, all three versions were top-10 hits.

Structure

The song is set in a basic four-

chord progression In a musical composition, a chord progression or harmonic progression (informally chord changes, used as a plural) is a succession of chords. Chord progressions are the foundation of harmony in Western musical tradition from the common practice ...

, either I-vi-ii-V7 or I-vi-IV-V7 depending on the

musical arrangement In music, an arrangement is a musical adaptation of an existing composition. Differences from the original composition may include reharmonization, melodic paraphrasing, orchestration, or formal development. Arranging differs from orchest ...

. The song has four verses of eight bars each, with no refrain or chorus, sung and performed in a slow swing rhythm. While different covers of "Oh Happy Day" phrased the lyrics somewhat differently, the official sheet music for the initial hit version by Don Howard has the following lyrics: The sun is shining, Oh Happy Day, No more troubles and no skies of gray, Ever since you said those words to me, You said you loved me, I know it's true. My life's complete, dear, for now I have you. Oh Happy Day, Oh lucky me. Howard originally performed it in the key of E major. Rhythmic errors in Howard's playing, audible especially in the first verse, were left in the finished product.

Origins

"Oh Happy Day" was one of the first pop hits whose momentum was driven by the high-school teen set. Don Howard Kaplow sang it accompanied by his guitar before his classmates at Cleveland Heights High School, in Cleveland, Ohio. At a Saturday high-school dance, the boys and girls called 13 times for "Oh Happy Day". This convinced Koplow to put the song on wax. Once it was played on the air, teenage fans besieged the disc jockey, Phil McLean of radio station WERE with requests that kept him spinning the song all week. Calls began coming in from nearby cities, and it was decided the record should go to market. A contract was signed in early November 1952 and "Oh Happy Day" went on sale. Upon release by a brand new record company (Triple A), 21,000 copies quickly sold around Cleveland. Then the record was leased to another label (Essex) for national distribution. By February 1953, it was pushing the half-million mark. The disc credited Kaplow as the composer, who sang under the professional name "Don Howard." His simple solo rendition, with no orchestra or backup singers, became known as a "garage hit." ''Time Magazine'' reported in 1953 that "Oh Happy Day" had a "folklike origin: Donnie heard it sung by an Ohio State girlfriend, who had picked it up on the campus. Donnie worked it out on his guitar, changed it a bit, wrote some lyrics, sang it at parties and prudently got it copyrighted.." Six weeks later, while "Oh Happy Day" was still on the pop charts, the ''

Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large na ...

'' reported that Nancy Binns Reed, a 28-year-old housewife, had filed a lawsuit to prove that she wrote the song. Represented by

Lee Eastman Lee Eastman (born Leopold Vail Epstein; January 12, 1910 – July 30, 1991) was an American show business attorney and art collector from New York City.Linda McCartney), a New York copyright and show business attorney, Mrs. Reed obtained affidavits from persons who had heard her singing the song when serving as a counselor at various camps and when she attended the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Franci ...

in the 1940s. She stated that many campers and high-school and college friends had learned the song. The lawsuit resulted in an out-of-court cash settlement along with an agreement that Mrs. Reed and Mr. Kaplow share equal credit for the song's words and music. ''Music Views'' magazine reported in its June 1953 edition that Kaplow's girlfriend had graduated from a girl's camp, where Ms. Reed had served as a counselor.

Chart performance

"Oh Happy Day" (not to be confused with the gospel hit of the same name) was known as the "people's hit" since it became a national

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hit song as well as an international hit without any initial support from the music industry. Because the song was credited to an amateur, it flew under the radar of professionals in the music business. Bandleader Lawrence Welk agreed to record it as a vehicle for his bass-voiced singer, Larry Hooper. Hooper recalled, "We got ahold of a tune to record that nobody else wanted, and we gambled with it." The song reached US number 3 in Cashbox and number 4 and 3 in ''Billboard''′s two national charts, respectively) and Australia singles charts at number 1. ''

Time Magazine ''Time'' (stylized in all caps) is an American news magazine based in New York City. For nearly a century, it was published weekly, but starting in March 2020 it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on Ma ...

'' called it the "Mystery Hit" and described it as the "rarest kind of hit, unplanned and unplugged." It was first released on record by Don Howard in early November 1952. Within two months, Don Howard's "Oh Happy Day" was still going up the charts, when two other versions of the same song by Lawrence Welk and by

also went up the US hit charts, Lawrence Welk's version reaching number 5 (''Billboard'' US national charts) and the Four Knights' version reaching number 8 (''Billboard'' US national charts). "Oh Happy Day" by Don Howard reached number 4 on the ''Billboard'' Chart. The ''Billboard'' confusion arises from the fact that ''Billboard'' printed two charts. One ranking for individual artist recordings of a song and one for combined sales of a song by all of the recorded versions. The number 3 ranking for "Oh Happy Day" in ''Billboard'' came from the ''Billboard'' "Honor Roll of Hits" listing. That ranking included ''all'' versions of "Oh Happy Day," not just the Don Howard version. The number 4 ranking in ''Billboard'' came from the chart listing "The Best Sellers in Stores" and only included sales of the Don Howard version. It did reach number 3 on the Cashbox Chart, which like the "Honor Roll of Hits" included all recordings of the same song. In reaching number 1 in Australia, this feat was achieved the week of July 18, 1953, several months after Oh Happy Day charted in the United States. The versions of Oh Happy Day performed by Lawrence Welk and by the Four Knights were cited together as the versions which made Oh Happy Day the number 1 hit in Australia. See Wikipedia article "List of number-one singles in Australia during the 1950s."

Other versions

Other performers released recorded versions of "Oh Happy Day" following the initial success by Don Howard. The January 10, 1953, edition of ''Billboard'' cited Lawrence Welk's version (Coral) as a likely upcoming hit, and noted in its January 17, 1953 edition that the versions by Four Knights (Capitol) and Dick Todd (Decca) were also likely upcoming hits. Other versions released by January 1953 in the US were those by J. Johnson (V),

Mickey Baker MacHouston "Mickey" Baker (October 15, 1925 – November 27, 2012) was an American guitarist, best known for his work as a studio musician and as part of the recording duo Mickey & Sylvia. Early life Baker was born in Louisville, Kentucky. His ...

(Savoy) and Ken Griffin (Columbia). In the ''Billboard'' Territorial Best Sellers (Popular) charts for the 15 top markets in the US, Don Howard's version had the greatest success, a number 1 ranking in

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Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

and

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and number 2 rankings in Pittsburgh and St. Louis. The Four Knights achieved a number 1 ranking in Seattle and a number 2 ranking in Atlanta. Lawrence Welk, in turn, achieved a number 2 ranking in the Los Angeles and Denver markets. Finally, during the same time period that various versions of "Oh Happy Day" were on the national US hit chart, Dick Todd's version charted at number 3 in New Orleans. "Oh Happy Day" is the only song that charted three different versions of the song in the top ten at the same time during calendar year 1953. This unprecedented achievement was otherwise unmatched for other years as well. One million records are estimated to have been sold of "Oh Happy Day" by June 1953.

Legacy and influence

In terms of legacy and influence, "Oh Happy Day" has been performed by numerous artists of various persuasions and interests. Folk versions (accompaniment by acoustic guitar only) were performed by Don Howard, Mickey Baker,

Dolph Dixon Dolph may refer to: People Given name or nickname * Dolph Briscoe (1923–2010), Governor of Texas from 1973 to 1979 * Dolph Camilli (1907–1997), American Major League Baseball player * Dolph Eckstein (1902–1963), American football player ...

, and

Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977), or simply Elvis, was an American singer and actor. Dubbed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one ...

. Don Howard's version has been released on a recent CD compilation entitled ''Songs That Inspired the King'' in reference to Elvis Presley. Elvis is known to have performed "Oh Happy Day" during the dress rehearsal for his 1968 Comeback Show and at an August 5, 1976, concert at the Sahara in

Las Vegas Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Vegas ...

. He described the chord arrangement on "Oh Happy Day" as representative of early rock and roll, stating "Oh Happy Day" was similar to the songs " Blue Moon" and " Young Love" in this regard. See Elvis's voice over on the CD From Burbank to Vegas, recorded at the Burbank Studios, Hollywood, where the 1968 dress rehearsal for the 1968 Comeback Show took place. The arrangement of Lawrence Welk's "Oh Happy Day" has also been described as early rock and roll. A more traditional big band 1940s sound is heard in the rendition by Geraldo and His Orchestra (UK). Other versions demonstrate a jazz orientation or influence including those by

Jimmy Giuffre James Peter Giuffre (, ; April 26, 1921 – April 24, 2008) was an American jazz clarinetist, saxophonist, composer, and arranger. He is known for developing forms of jazz which allowed for free interplay between the musicians, anticipating f ...

, Dick Erickson and Ron Levin and Milt Levitt Orchestra. Other international versions were performed by the Johnston Brothers (number 4 in the UK); Pilgrim With Rhythm Quartette (UK), Don Cameron (UK), Dave Carey (UK), Leo Heppe u.d. Continentals & Lutz Alberecht u.s. Orchester (

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

and sung in German); Mieke Telkamp (Germany) and Dick Todd (Canada). The Four Knights rendition has been described as early doo-wop rock and roll and several more explicitly doo-wop versions followed in the 1950s and 1960s by the Singing Belles, the Skylites, Dion, Rick Martell & the Angels,

the Five Satins The Five Satins are an American doo-wop group, best known for their 1956 million-selling song, " In the Still of the Night." They were formed in 1954 and continued performing until 1994. When it was formed, the group consisted of six members, w ...

, and Stephanie & the Gothics. Dion's "Oh Happy Day", recorded in 1963, has been described as a stand-out doo-wop recording on his "Bronx Blues: The Columbia Recordings” album. Other artists that have recorded "Oh Happy Day" include

Tab Hunter Tab Hunter (born Arthur Andrew Kelm; July 11, 1931 – July 8, 2018) was an American actor, singer, film producer, and author. Known for his blond, clean-cut good looks, Hunter starred in more than forty films. He was a Hollywood heartthrob of t ...

the Four Lads The Four Lads was a Canadian male singing quartet which, in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, earned many gold singles and albums. Its million-selling signature tunes include " Moments to Remember"; " Standing on the Corner"; " No, Not Much"; "Who Nee ...

, Homer & Jethro, Kamahl, Bill Buchanan, the Honey Dreamers and Don McPherson and the Hy-powers. Homer & Jethro's "Unhappy Day", a parody of "Oh Happy Day", stays faithful to the melody and brings forth a chuckle. Not only did the teenagers set a pervasive influence in making "Oh Happy Day" a national and international hit, the song was heavily performed by local artists throughout the US. In 1953 it was performed at minstrel shows, various high-school assemblies, homecoming festivities, music programs in farming communities, and at talent shows.''Ada Evening News'', Ada, Okla, March 10, 1953. The Welk arrangement of the song would become a regular feature on Welk's '' Dodge Dancing Party'' and its succeeding television shows, becoming Larry Hooper's signature song.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Oh Happy Day (1952 song) 1952 songs