MAMA, I WANNA MAKE RHYTHM
From the film "Manhattan Merry-Go-Round" (1937)
(Jerome Jerome / Richard Byron / Walter Kent)

Cab Calloway & His Cotton Club Orch. (Film Soundtrack) - 1937
Phil Reagan (Film Soundtrack) - 1937
Bunny Berigan & His Orch. - 1937
Ben Pollack & His Orch. (vocal: Connee Boswell) - 1937
Lew Stone & His Band (vocal: Al Bowlly) - 1938
Harry Roy & His Orch. (vocal: Ray Ellington) - 1938

Also recorded by: The Chenille Sisters.


Yasha was a prodigy, since he was a kid of three
He could play a rhapsody as good as they come
But as strange as it may be, Yasha hated melody
He had a yen for tympani, he longed to play a drum
When his Mother made him practice on the fiddle every day
He'd stop right in the middle and he'd say....

Mama, I wanna make rhythm
Don't wanta make music
Just wanna go zoozi-zah-zah-zoozi
Ooh-cah-dee-doodle-oodle-aah-doo

Mama, I wanna get hotcha
I wanta make boombah
I wanna go gah-gah
Za-rah-kah, zat-zow, ooh-dee-lah

I've got no desire to carry a Stradivarius, but
There's no limit of primitive tom-tom in my tum-tum

Mama, I wanna make rhythm
Don't wanta make music
Just wanna go wookee-ah-kay-a-kaya-kaya
Yag-a-yag-a-yag-a-yag


**The "scat singing" varies with each recording.


(Transcribed by Mel Priddle - February 2005)