I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing (In Perfect Harmony)


"I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing " is a pop song that originated as the jingle "Buy the World a Coke" in the groundbreaking 1971 "Hilltop" television commercial for Coca-Cola and sung by The Hillside Singers. "Buy the World a Coke" was produced by Billy Davis and portrayed a positive message of hope and love, featuring a multicultural collection of teenagers on top of a hill appearing to sing the song.
The popularity of the jingle led to it being re-recorded in two versions; one by The New Seekers and another by The Hillside Singers, as a full-length song, dropping references to Coca-Cola. The song became a hit record in the US and the UK.

Origins

The idea originally came to Bill Backer, an advertising executive working for McCann Erickson, the agency responsible for Coca-Cola. Backer, Roger Cook and Billy Davis were delayed at Shannon Airport in Ireland. After a forced layover with many hot tempers, they noticed their fellow travelers the next morning were talking and joking while drinking Coca-Cola. Backer wrote the line "I'd like to buy the world a Coke" on a napkin and shared it with British hit songwriters Cook and Roger Greenaway.
The melody was derived from a previous jingle by Cook and Greenaway, originally called "True Love and Apple Pie" that was recorded in 1971 by Susan Shirley. Cook, Greenaway, Backer, and Billy Davis reworked the song into a Coca-Cola radio jingle, which was performed by English pop group The New Seekers and recorded at Trident Studios in London. The radio jingle made its debut in February 1971 before being adapted for the iconic Coca-Cola "Hilltop" television commercial later that year.
The commercial ended with the statement:
The song became so popular that its creators revised it, adding three verses and removing product references to create a full-length song appropriate for commercial release. The full-length song was re-recorded by both The Hillside Singers and The New Seekers and both versions became huge hits.

TV commercial

Lyrics

"Buy the World a Coke" contains the line "I'd like to buy the world a Coke" and repeats "It's the real thing", which was Coca-Cola's marketing slogan at the time. The Coca-Cola Company introduced that slogan in October 1969.

Versions as an ad

Several versions of the ad have been made.
In 2007, Campaign magazine called it "one of the best-loved and most influential ads in TV history". It served as a milestone—the first instance of the recording industry's involvement with advertising.
Marketing analysts have noted Coca-Cola's strategy of marrying the idea of happiness and universal love of the product illustrated by the song.
The commercial has continued receiving accolades in more recent times. In 2000, Channel 4 and The Sunday Times ranked the song 16th in the 100 Greatest TV Ads, while in 2005, ITV ranked the advertisement 10th in its list of the greatest advertisements of all time.

Singles

The Hillside Singers

After the TV commercial aired, radio stations began to get calls from people who liked it. Billy Davis' friends in radio suggested he record the song, but not as an advertising jingle. It became so popular that the song was rewritten without brand name references and expanded to three verses. Davis recruited a group of studio singers to take it on because The New Seekers did not have time to record it. The studio group named themselves The Hillside Singers to identify with the ad, and within two weeks the song was on the national charts. The Hillside Singers' version reached #13 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #5 on Billboard's Easy Listening chart. Billboard ranked this version as the No. 97 song for 1972.

The New Seekers

The New Seekers later recorded the song and sold 96,000 copies of their record in one day, eventually selling 12 million total. "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing " climbed to UK #1 and US #7 in 1971 and 1972. The song became a gold record in the U.S., and has also sold over a million copies in the UK. The Coca-Cola Company waived royalties to the song, and instead donated $80,000 in payments to UNICEF. Billboard ranked this version as the No. 93 song for 1972.

Chart performance

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

New Seekers version

Chart Peak
position
Australia7

Chart Rank
Australia66
Canada29
UK5
US Billboard Hot 10093

Hillside Singers version

Chart Peak
position

Chart Rank
US Billboard Hot 10097

Covers and inspiration for other music

The commercial was used as the final scene in the Mad Men series finale, "Person to Person", which was set in November 1970, at an oceanside spiritual retreat in California. It is implied that the show's fictional protagonist, Don Draper, was behind the commercial's creation.
The song was featured briefly in the 2001 movie Freddy Got Fingered and was also used in Jeremy Paxman's final edition of Newsnight in 2014.