Bright College Days

## Lyrics

SPOKEN INTRODUCTION

Thank you! For my first encore I’d like to turn to a type of song… to a type of song that people like myself find ourselves subjected to with increasing frequency as time goes on, and that is the college “alma mater”.

You’ll find yourself at a reunion of old grads, and old undergrads, and eh… somebody will start croaking out one of these things and everyone will gradually join in – each in his own key, of course – until the place is just *soggy* with nostalgia.

Well, a typical such song might be called “Bright College Days” and might go like this.

SUNG

Bright college days, oh, carefree days that fly

```
This is likely a reference to “Bright College Years,” which is the unofficial but universally recognized alma mater song of Yale.

```

To thee we sing with our glasses raised on high

```
In live renditions, Lehrer would raise his signature eyeglasses above his head as he sang this lyric.

```

```
This is one of several references to The Whiffenpoof Song, the signature song of the oldest collegiate a cappella group in the country and a proprietor of the sentiments Lehrer is parodying.

```

Let's drink a toast as each of us recalls

Ivy-covered professors in ivy-covered halls

Turn on the spigot

Pour the beer and swig it

And gaudeamus igit-ur

```
“Gaudeamus igitur” is Latin for “let us therefore rejoice.” It is also the title of a popular, centuries-old fraternity drinking song that still would have been in popular use in Ivy League schools in Lehrer’s time.

```

Here's to parties we tossed

To the games that we lost

(We shall claim that we won them some day)

To the girls young and sweet

To the spacious back seat

Of our roommate's beat up Chevrolet

To the beer and Benzedrine

```
In pill form, colloquially known as “bennies,” Benzedrine is an amphetamine widely used during the mid-20th century by “scientists and mathematicians as well as poets and novelists” (and, presumably, students).

```

To the way that the dean

Tried so hard to be pals with us all

To excuses we fibbed

To the papers we cribbed

From the genius who lived down the hall

To the tables down at Mory's (Wherever that may be)

```
This is a reference to the Whiffenpoof Song, written in 1910 by the Yale Whiffenpoofs and a prime example of the sort of nonsense Lehrer is parodying with this song:

```

```
To the tables down at Mory’s, To the place where Louis dwells, To the dear old Temple Bar We love so well,

```

```
Sing the Whiffenpoofs assembled With their glasses raised on high, And the magic of their singing casts its spell.

```

```
Lehrer also mimics a slightly later part of the song:

```

```
We will serenade our Louis While life and voice shall last Then we’ll pass and be forgotten with the rest.

```

```
Mory’s Temple Bar is a private club, directly associated with Yale since 1912.

```

Let us drink a toast to all we love the best

We will sleep through all the lectures

And cheat on the exams

And we'll pass, and be forgotten with the rest

Oh, soon we'll be out amid the cold world's strife

Soon we'll be sliding down the razor blade of life

(Laughter)

[spoken] Ready?

(Laughter)

But as we go our sordid sep'rate ways

We shall ne'er forget thee, thou golden college days

Hearts full of youth

Hearts full of truth

Six parts gin to one part vermouth

```
The recipe for an extra-dry Martini cocktail.

```

```
Traditionally the ratio of gin to vermouth is from 2:1 to 4:1 in a martini, the latter being considered dry (that is, non-sweet by virtue of the gin). Lehrer pushes it to extremes for comedic effect.

```