First World War.com - Vintage Audio - Oh! How I Hate To Get Up In The Morning

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Sheet music to "Oh! How I Hate To Get Up In The Morning" Vintage Audio: Oh! How I Hate To Get Up In The Morning
Updated - Sunday, 16 February, 2003

Reproduced below are the lyrics to the popular American wartime (and beyond) song, Oh! How I Hate To Get Up In The Morning, words and music by Irving Berlin in 1918.

Berlin himself served with the U.S. 77th Division from April 1917, at that time having already established his name as a popular composer. During his wartime service Berlin continued to produce highly topical wartime themes: Oh! How I Hate To Get Up In The Morning proved a remarkable success and went on to sell 1.5 million sheet music copies.

Two recordings of the song are available here. Click here to listen to Eddie Cantor perform the song in 1918 (WAV format 254kb); and click here to hear Arthur Fields' version, also recorded in 1918 (MP3 format 1,013kb).

Oh, How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning

First Verse:
The other day I chanced to meet a soldier friend of mine,
He’d been in camp for sev’ral weeks and he was looking fine;
His muscles had developed and his cheeks were rosy red,
I asked him how he liked the life, and this is what he said:

First Chorus:
“Oh! how I hate to get up in the morning,
Oh! how I’d love to remain in bed;
For the hardest blow of all, is to hear the bugler call;
You’ve got to get up, you’ve got to get up
You’ve got to get up this morning!
Some day I’m going to murder the bugler,
Some day they’re going to find him dead;
I’ll amputate his reveille, and step upon it heavily,
And spend the rest of my life in bed."

Second Chorus:
“Oh! how I hate to get up in the morning,
Oh! how I’d love to remain in bed;
For the hardest blow of all, is to hear the bugler call;
You’ve got to get up, you’ve got to get up
You’ve got to get up this morning!
Oh! boy the minute the battle is over,
Oh! boy the minute the foe is dead;
I'll put my uniform away, and move to Philadelphia,
And spend the rest of my life in bed."

Second Verse:
A bugler in the army is the luckiest of men,
He wakes the boys at five and then goes back to bed again;
He doesn’t have to blow again until the afternoon,
If ev’ry thing goes well with me I'll be a bugler soon.

Repeat Chorus One
Repeat Chorus Two

"Suicide Ditch" was a term used by British soldiers to refer to the front-line trench.