Background
She learned music from her father, Calvin Cody, and Adolph Weidig.
She learned music from her father, Calvin Cody, and Adolph Weidig.
Hill, born in Louisville, Kentucky, was the oldest of three sisters, Mildred, Patty, and Jessica. Professor Robert Brauneis, after extensively researching the Hill family, has concluded that she was not a kindergarten teacher. She moved into music, teaching, composing, performing, and specializing in the study of Negro spirituals.
She wrote about music using the pen name Johann Tonsor, and her 1892 article "Negro Music", suggesting that the existing body of black music would be the basis of a distinctive American musical style, influenced Dvořák in composing the New World Symphony.
Mildred Hill"s manuscripts and papers are held by the University of Louisville Music Library in Louisville, Kentucky. While teaching at the Louisville Experimental Kindergarten School, the Hill sisters wrote the song "Good Morning to All".
Mildred wrote the melody, and Patty the lyrics. first appeared in print in 1912 using the melody of "Good Morning to All" with different lyrics. Its popularity continued to grow through the 1930s, with no author identified for the new lyrics, nor cr given for the melody from "Good Morning to You".
Based on 1935 copyright registrations by the Summy Company, and a series of court cases (which all settled out of court), the sisters became known as the authors of The Hill Foundation today shares royalties on public performances of the song.
However this was brought into question after a judge ruled against the legitimacy of the copyright.