I did the same thing when I was a graduate student at UCSC in the late 80’s–the lectures I heard were on Boolean algebra. He seemed to be a clear and engaging lecturer. His musical theater course involved a final project where the class put on a musical, which minimal props or costumes and Dr. Lehrer providing all the music on the piano–I saw The Music Man.
My aunt was a long-time Santa Cruzan and attended parties with him. Apparently he was happy to play other people’s music but never his own–probably because he was bored with it.
Wow! That song is one of my favorites, since Lehrer has a tour-de-force of rhymes in there - when he rhymes liability, disability, senility, sterility, and 10 more words in one lengthy verse.
I tend to think that he’s one who never got over the Kennedy assassination. I’ve known a number of people, young, optimistic New Frontier liberals, who soured on life after 11/22.
Though TL does say that line, I believe it was originally written by H Allen Smith. I can’t provide a cite, 'cos I can’t remember which book it was in. Now I have to go re-read all the H Allen Smith I have. Oh it’s a hard life.
Back to the subjects at hand, or rather the CDs in my hand there is a box set of The Complete Flanders and Swan (At the Drop of a Hat, At the Drop of another Hat, The bestiary of Flanders and Swan) availble. And a fantastic Tom Lehrer set The Remain of Tom Lehrer which includes the usual records plus the live sessions (The Richard Haymen sessions, The Joe Raposo sessions for the Electric Company and The Bob Fisher sessions which date from 1999 and a couple of previously unissued recordings (That’s Mathematics, I got it from Agnes)).
No one has mentioned the Folk Song Army yet? Though Poisoning Pigeons is my favourite. First time I went to Boston, a friend who is resident there showed me the tourist sights. He even took me to a park and proudly proclaimed “And THIS is where Tom Lehrer poisoned the pigeons!”
Ahh, The wonderful joys of seeing a zombie thread that you started when really drunk, and have no memory of whatsoever.
Kind of like discovering a new friend who you have a fair amount in common with
I’m glad everyone is joining in “Each in his own key, of course.”
I’m a huge Tom Lehrer fan. Playing the Vatican Rag for Mama Zappa shortly after we met is one of the reasons I’m married to her. Can’t get better than that!
TL is hugely influential. You find quotes of him in the most unexpected places. I read an article about the Apollo program that quoted “some wag” as saying we’re “spending twenty billion of your dollars to put some clown on the moon.” That was not just ANY wag - that was Tom Lehrer!
When Tomfoolery opened, I read an article about it in the Washington Post. When asked why he stopped performing publicly, TL said
*The mariachis would serenade
And they would not shut up 'til they were paid
We ate, we drank and we were merry
And we got typhoid and dysentery. *
Having lived in El Paso for 20 years, this verse has given me a chuckle every time.
A late, lamented member of the Gilbert & Sullivan Society to which I belong used to sing Lehrer songs at a lot of our musical revues. Another member performed a highly creditable rendition of The Elements at a recent society function, to much acclaim.
For those who don’t have the music book Too Many Songs by Tom Lehrer. . . or do and haven’t noticed. Here are the tempo instructions for some of the songs (for non-musicians this is where the composer says how the piece should be played, y’know like allegro, andante…)
Spoilers added to apply industry standards for narrative tension (?) label where translation or explanation would be appreciated. It does help of course to know what the songs are about.
I’m not sure when I first got into Tom Lehrer. I have very clear memories of his songs on The Electric Company, but I didn’t know who he was at that time. I suspect that I picked up An Evening Wasted With… at the public library for some reason, and got hooked. I know that by senior year of high school I had consumed everything of his I could get my hands on.
My Government/Civics teacher used to play, “Whatever Became of Hubert?” every year. I suspect that most people were unimpressed, but I loved it (I always liked Mr. Dennery, despite the fact that most people thought he was boring. He wasn’t - he was just a civics nerd). I talked him into playing, “The Vatican Rag” (lots of Catholics in our school - I think he thought he’d get complaints), and that actually got some of my classmates interested. I doubt there were any real converts to the awesomeness that is Tom Lehrer, but it wasted one period of school quite effectively.
Many of the questions asked here are answered in the Wikipedia entry on Lehrer:
In particular, no particular political event caused him to quit writing or performing. He jokingly said that some things did cause his quitting, but other times he explained that he was just kidding about that. What you’ve got to understand is that music was never more than a hobby for him. He was at the very least one of the best half-dozen musical satirists of the last 60 years, and some would say that he was clearly the best of them. He did all this just in his off hours. The idea of having to perform his songs again and again bored him. He turned out all of his songs quickly, and there weren’t really very many of them.
He was smart enough that he didn’t have to put a lot of effort into anything he did, so he didn’t. He was a child prodigy who entered Harvard at 15. He never finished his Ph.D. because he lost interest in it. He could already turn out a satirical song as good as “Fight Fiercely, Harvard” at 17. He figured out quickly the way he could make a living with a little songwriting and performing when he was younger and then living off the royalties and some teaching later in his life. He didn’t do anymore than he had to.
Also, remember that his melodies were always in the Tin Pan Alley style of the 1940’s and 1950’s. They never advanced beyond that. I don’t think he could write anything in the musical styles of 1960 or later.
You know, I think that there’s a great biography to be written about him. I’d like to write it. Anybody want to help me get a contract for it?
Nobody has mentioned my favorite Lehrer line yet, from “Bright College Days” –
“Soon we’ll be out, amid the cold world’s strife…
Soon we’ll be sliding down the razor-blade of life…”
By the by, a quick Youtube search turns up lots of clips of Tom, older and sadder, sitting at a piano and doing some of his more obscure songs a capella. Very good stuff…TRM
there is a box set of The Complete Flanders and Swan (At the Drop of a Hat, At the Drop of another Hat, The bestiary of Flanders and Swan) availble. And a fantastic Tom Lehrer set The Remain of Tom Lehrer which includes the usual records plus the live sessions (The Richard Haymen sessions, The Joe Raposo sessions for the Electric Company and The Bob Fisher sessions which date from 1999 and a couple of previously unissued recordings (That’s Mathematics, I got it from Agnes)).
