In July 1958, Ong Pang Boon, the Deputy Mayor of the City Council of Singapore, approached Zubir Said, a score arranger and songwriter with Cathay-Keris Film Productions, to compose a theme song for the Council's official functions to be titled "Majulah Singapura" (Malay for "Onward Singapore").

In a 1984 oral history interview, he recalled the process: "[T]he difficulty is in such a short melody, I have to put in all the words.... [I]t must be very simple, understandable for all the races in Singapore....

[6] The completed composition was first performed on 6 September 1958 by the Singapore Chamber Ensemble during the grand finale of a concert staged in the Victoria Theatre to celebrate its official reopening.

The Deputy Prime Minister Toh Chin Chye selected the City Council's song as it was already popular.

At Toh's request, Zubir modified the lyrics and melody,[3] and the revised song was adopted by the Legislative Assembly on 11 November 1959.

"Majulah Singapura" was formally introduced to the nation on 3 December when Yusof bin Ishak was inaugurated as the Yang di-Pertuan Negara, Singapore's head of state.

At the same occasion, which also marked the launch of "Loyalty Week", the national flag and the state crest were introduced.

After Singapore's full independence from Malaysia on 9 August 1965, "Majulah Singapura" was formally adopted as the Republic's national anthem.

Due to National Service commitments, Taufik had to decline and was replaced by singer Jai Wahab.

Saluting is unnecessary if service personnel are indoors when a flag raising or lowering ceremony takes place.

[40] On 19 January 2001, "Majulah Singapura" was officially relaunched in the F-major key, as it was said to be a "grander and more inspiring arrangement"[41] of the anthem.

He proposed that the original composition in G major resulted in a highest note being E, which he felt was too high pitched to sing easily, so he proposed a slightly lower F major that results in the highest note being a more easily sung D.[42] The panel selected the version submitted by Cultural Medallion winner Phoon Yew Tien.

[41][45] On 3 December 2019, a new recording of "Majulah Singapura" by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra was released with improvements in sound quality.

Zubir Said modified the song from there, as requested by Toh Chin Chye, by removing 8 bars starting from "Bangun dengan bersatu sama-sama..." to "...kerja sama menuju bahagia!"

[51] The move was also seen as making the anthem more neutral as the eight bars also contained subtle motives brought from Malay musical elements.

Interviewed by the Oral History Department in 1989, Toh Chin Chye said it was appropriate for the national anthem to be in Malay, "the indigenous language of the region, as English is not native to this part of the world."

[55] In particular, some grassroots leaders argued that since the Chinese constitute a majority of the population, a Mandarin version of the anthem should be used.

[55] The Prime Minister's response was that he would keep the national anthem as it was but would ensure that translations in other mother tongues were more easily available.

All Singaporean children of kindergarten age have not only had no difficulty memorising the words but have for decades sung it every morning with 'strong feelings and emotion'."

He also noted that the anthem had nevertheless already been translated into Singapore's three other official languages (English, Mandarin and Tamil) for those who cannot understand Malay.

All the interviewees, including those who did not know the meaning of the lyrics, said they nevertheless felt a sense of pride and patriotism when they heard or sang the national anthem.

[54] Singer Taufik Batisah was criticised for incorrectly singing the word berseru (to proclaim) instead of bersatu (to unite) during his rendition of "Majulah Singapura" before the start of the 2009 Formula 1 SingTel Singapore Grand Prix on 27 September 2009.

However, most of the persons surveyed disagreed that the anthem should be in English, with one respondent saying: "It's better in Malay because there's a cultural history to it and [it] is more meaningful, and has traces to our roots.