80th birthday
Eighty years. Let them hear their life sung slowly enough to catch every word.
An 80th birthday song they can hear every word of
Eighty is a birthday usually celebrated close to home, with the family around one table. The best eightieth songs are slow, simple and full of names and places the birthday person will recognize from the first line.
Hear the second a name lands
Linda, your love is in the cards you play,
You wrote“Now she babysits my daughter every Thursday and teaches her the same card games.”
The song singsTeaching my daughter those card games today.
From a real song made here: “Every Thursday with Linda”, for Linda, from what her son typed.
The moment you give it
Sit next to them and play it at their volume, not yours. A slow ballad gives them time to hear their name, their town and their grandchildren, and they will ask whose idea it was.
Eightieth, close family, home
Eighty years of you.
Turn it up as loud as you like.
Start with one memory
Pick a question. The form opens with your first line already started.
A gentle birthday song from our samples
A piano ballad written for an 18th, played here to show how soft and clear this style sounds.
What you get for $12.99
You hear it first, free. You pay once, only if you keep it.
- Free preview
- The first 60 seconds, ready in about two minutes after you enter your email. No card.
- The song
- The full song, about two minutes long, as an MP3 to download and keep.
- Lyrics
- Every line is on the preview page before you pay. Unlocking adds the lyric sheet, to print or save as a PDF.
- Their link
- A private link that plays the whole song without an account, with your name and a short note. Switch it off any time.
- Photo video
- Free: a vertical 9:16 photo video of your photos with the lyrics on screen, plus 15- and 30-second cuts. Made in your browser.
- The name
- Unusual name? Type how to say it (SEER-sha for Saoirse) and the singer says it that way.
- Re-record
- One free re-record per song: change a line, the style or the voice and record it again.
- Name sung wrong?
- After you pay, a free remake with the name fixed, once per song.
- Languages
- Sung in English, German, French, Spanish or Japanese.
- Teaser
- Before you pay, a 15-second teaser link that tells them a song is on its way.
- For this song
- Posting it? The 15-second cut fits an Instagram story and the 30-second cut a Reel, with the lyrics already on screen.
- Want a nudge next year? Opt in and we email you three weeks and one week before the date.
Names and places they will know
- The neighbors or friends who still visit every week.
- The town they were born in, by name.
- Their parents or siblings, if they still talk about them.
- The partner they married, and where.
- Each child's name, if there are only a few.
- A song, dish or saying that has been in the family for decades.
For example
A son writing for his mother's eightieth might type:
- Mom was born in Galway, came to Boston at nineteen and never lost the accent.
- She raised five of us on Dorchester Avenue and fed half the street on Sundays.
- She still does the crossword in pen every morning at the kitchen table.
Choosing a style for an eightieth
Pick the piano ballad and ask for a slow, simple melody in your lines. If the name is unusual or from another language, type how it is said; the singer uses your spelling and the lyric sheet keeps the real one.
Playing it at the table
- Let a grandchild sit beside them and point out their own name when it comes up.
- Turn off other music and the television first.
- Sit them close to the speaker and play it twice: once to hear it, once to enjoy it.
- Read the lyric sheet aloud after if hearing is difficult.
More song ideas
Questions
Eighty years, in a song they can follow.
Type their first name and the town where they were born.