I was having a bit of a chill out last night and had my iPod on shuffle, which can be a bit of a strange experience as my musical taste could be best described as eclectic so one minute might be chilling out to some Vivaldi only to then have my ears blasted out by Rammstein.
During this aural assault some Tom Lehrer came on and I could not help but grin, so I thought I would share some of his work with you.
First a bit of background. Lehrer studied Mathematics at Harvard University and received his MA degree in 1948 at the tender age of 20. He taught classes at MIT, Harvard and Wellesley remaining at Harvard for several years in their doctoral program but taking some time out to work as a researcher at Los Alamos. His last mathematical lecture was in 2001.
Musically he started studying the piano at the age of 7. although his learning was more classically orientated he was more interested in the popular music of the day and he started writing his own show tunes. He became most famous for parodying popular songs and his commentary on social issues.
We will start off with his piece called ‘The Elements’, even if you have not heard of Lehrer before you will quite possibly have heard this one at some time. Basically it is the list of all known elements ( written in 1959 that means up to 102, nobelium ) sung to the tune of the ‘Major General’s Song’ from Gilbert and Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance. Lehrer got the idea from ‘Tchaikovsky and Other Russians’ which was written by Ira Gershwin and listed 50 Russian composers.
Next up is possibly my favourite, yes I do have a bit of a warped sense of humour 
So here we go with ‘Poisoning Pigeons in the Park’
If only Mathematics was this much fun at school, although I have to admit it was nearly at Polytechnic thanks to a brilliant lecturer called Dr Katz … ‘New Math’
Sometimes Lehrer’s lyrics would be quite controversial, in fact he had trouble with getting any air time on American radio to start. Here is his take on nuclear bombs in a piece called ‘We Will All Go Together When We Go’
Now some commentary on environmental issues entitled ‘Pollution’
And just to finish up some BDSM Prepare to dance to the ‘The Masochism Tango’ :