Mathematician, professor and satirist Tom Lehrer died last week. He was 97.
Lehrer’s heyday in the pop world peaked in the 50s and 60s.
I only knew about him in an ancillary fashion, because my parents weren’t on
the intellectual left of the spectrum, and I was more of a Stan Freburg girl.
But I came to enjoy Lehrer when his songs popped up as retro in my adulthood.
One of the most amusing, to my mind, is “The Elements”, a
song listing all the Periodic Table elements (up to time of writing) to the
melody of the Gilbert & Sullivan patter song, “I Am the Very Model of a
Modern Major General”, from Pirates of Penzance.
Fun Fact: The song was a clue in an episode of NCIS, many
years ago.
I’m not giving you Lehrer singing it, because I rather
fancy this animated version; it neatly illustrates Lehrer’s cleverness.
I know people who sang this over and over again to learn
the Periodic Table. (I made a big model of it on butcher paper and taped it to
the wall on the way to the bathroom.)
©2025 Bas Bleu
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