Nice Work If You Can Get It the Musical - By Strauss Lyrics

(Performed by Judy Kaye and Michael McGrath)

[Estonia]
Away with the music of Broadway!
Be off with your Irving Berlin!
Oh, I'd give no quarter
To Kern or Cole Porter,
And Gershwin keeps pounding on tin.

How can I be civil
When hearing this drivel?
It's only for nightclubbing souses.
Oh, give me the free'n'easy
Waltz that is Viennesey --

And, go tell the band
If they want a hand,
The waltz must be Strauss's.
Ya, ya, ya -- give me oom-pah-pah!

When I want a melody
Lilting through the house,
Then I want a melody
By Strauss.
It laughs! It sings! The world is in rhyme,
Swinging to three-quarter time.

Let the Danube flow along,
And the Fledermaus!
Keep the wine and give me song
By Strauss!
By jo, by jing!
By Strauss is the thing!
So I say to ha-cha-cha
Heruas!
Just give me an oom-pah-pah
By Strauss!

[Cookie]
Grab a cab and go down
To where the band is playing;
Where milk and honey flow down
Where ev'ry one is saying:
"Blow that sweet and low-down!"

Come along, get in it --
You'll love the syncopation!
The minute they begin it,
You're shouting to the nation:
"Blow --"

[Estonia]
How can I be civil
When hearing this drivel?
It's only for nightclubbing souses.
Oh, give me the free'n'easy
Waltz that is Viennesey --

[Estonia] (simultaneously)
When I want a melody
Lifting through the house,
Then I want a melody
By Strauss.
It laughs! It sings! The world is in rhyme,

Swinging to three-quarter t--
Swinging to three-quarter t--
Three-quarter!
Three-quarter!
Swinging to three-quarter time!

By jo, by jing!
By Strauss is the thing!
So I say to ha-cha-cha
Heruas!
Just give me an oom-pah-pah
By Strauss!
By Strauss!
By Strauss!
By Strauss!