Before attending college, Lehrer graduated from the Loomis Chaffee School in Windsor, Connecticut. As an undergraduate student at Harvard University, he began to write comic songs to entertain his friends, including Fight Fiercely, Harvard (1945). Those songs later became (in a joking reference to a leading scientific journal, The Physical Review) The Physical Revue. Influenced mainly by musical theater, his style consisted of parodying then-current forms of popular song. For example, his appreciation of list songs led him to set the names of the chemical elements to the tune of Gilbert and Sullivan's "Major-General's Song".
Inspired by the success of his performances of his songs, he paid for some studio time to record an album, Songs By Tom Lehrer, which he sold by mail order. Self-published and unpromoted, the album, which included the macabre (I Hold Your Hand in Mine), the mildly risqué (Be Prepared), and the mathematical (Lobachevsky), became a success via word of mouth. With a cult hit, he embarked on a series of concert tours and released a second album, which came in two versions: the songs were the same but More Songs by Tom Lehrer was studio-recorded, while An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer was recorded live in concert.
Lehrer's major break into the United Kingdom came as a result of the citation accompanying an honorary degree given to Princess Margaret, where she cited musical tastes as "catholic, ranging from Mozart to Tom Lehrer". This produced significant interest in his works, and helped secure distributors for his material. Ironically, it was in the UK where his music ended up more popular due to the proliferation of university newspapers referring to the material, and the willingness of the BBC to play his songs on the radio (something that was a rarity in the USA).
By the early 1960s, Lehrer had retired from touring (which he intensely disliked) and was employed as the resident songwriter for the US edition of That Was The Week That Was (TW3), a satirical TV show. An increased proportion of his output became overtly political, or at least topical, on subjects such as pollution (Pollution), Vatican II (The Vatican Rag), race relations (National Brotherhood Week), education (New Math), American militarism (Send the Marines), World War III nostalgia (So Long, Mom, premiered by Steve Allen), and nuclear proliferation (Who's Next? and MLF Lullaby). He also wrote a song which satirized the alleged amorality of Wernher von Braun. A selection of these songs was released in the album That Was The Year That Was.
The record deal with Reprise Records for the That Was The Year That Was album also gave Reprise distribution rights for Lehrer's earlier recordings, as Lehrer wanted to shut down his own Lehrer Records. The Reprise issue of Songs by Tom Lehrer was a stereo re-recording. This version was not issued on CD, but the songs were issued on the live Tom Lehrer Revisited on CD instead.
There is an urban legend that Lehrer gave up political satire when the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Henry Kissinger in 1973. He did say that the awarding of the prize to Kissinger made political satire obsolete, but has denied that he stopped doing satire as a form of protest, and asserts that he had stopped doing satire several years earlier. Another urban legend held that he had been sued for libel by the subject of one of his songs, Wernher Von Braun, and been forced to relinquish all of his royalty income to Von Braun. However, Lehrer firmly denied this in an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald. (He had also mentioned Frank Fontaine and Jerry Lewis in "National Brotherhood Week", in an uncomplimentary context, on the same album, but nothing resulted from that.)
When asked about his reasons for abandoning his musical career, he cited a simple lack of interest, a distaste for touring, and boredom with performing the same songs repeatedly. He has observed that when he was moved to write and perform songs, he did; when he wasn't, he didn't, and after a while the latter situation prevailed. It has been frequently observed that, though many of Lehrer's songs satirized the Cold War political establishment of the day, that he stopped writing and performing just as the 1960s counterculture movement gained momentum. Lehrer has stated that he doubts his songs had an impact on those not already critical of the establishment: "I don't think this kind of thing has an impact on the unconverted, frankly. It's not even preaching to the converted; it's titillating the converted... I'm fond of quoting Peter Cook, who talked about the satirical Berlin cabarets of the '30s, which did so much to stop the rise of Hitler and prevent the Second World War."
Lehrer's musical career was notably brief, stating in an interview in the late 90s that he had performed a mere 109 shows, and written 37 songs across his 20-year career. Nevertheless, the cult following that had grown around his music significantly bolstered the effect that he had on a global scale.
In the 1970s, Lehrer concentrated on teaching mathematics and musical theater, although he also wrote 10 songs for the children's television show The Electric Company. (Harvard schoolmate Joe Raposo was the show's musical director for its first three seasons.) In the early 1980s, Tom Foolery, a revival of his songs on the London stage, was a surprise hit. Although not its instigator, Lehrer eventually gave it his full support and updated several of his lyrics for the production.
On 7 June and 8 June 1998, Tom Lehrer performed in public for the first time in 25 years at the Lyceum Theatre, London as part of the gala show Hey Mr Producer! celebrating the career of impresario Cameron Mackintosh (who had been the producer of Tom Foolery). The 8 June show has been his only performance before the Queen. Lehrer sang Poisoning Pigeons in the Park and an updated version of "Who's Next". The DVD of the event includes the former song.
In 2000, a CD box set, The Remains of Tom Lehrer, was released by Rhino Entertainment. It included live and studio versions of his first two albums, That Was The Year That Was, the songs he wrote for The Electric Company, and some previously unreleased material, accompanied by a small hardbound book containing an introduction by Dr. Demento and lyrics to all the songs.
Lehrer celebrated his 80th birthday on April 9th 2008.
Elements
Tom Lehrer Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
And hydrogen and oxygen and nitrogen and rhenium,
And nickel, neodymium, neptunium, germanium,
And iron, americium, ruthenium, uranium,
Europium, zirconium, lutetium, vanadium,
And lanthanum and osmium and astatine and radium,
And gold, protactinium and indium and gallium,
There's yttrium, ytterbium, actinium, rubidium,
And boron, gadolinium, niobium, iridium,
There's strontium and silicon and silver and samarium,
And bismuth, bromine, lithium, beryllium, and barium.
There's holmium and helium and hafnium and erbium,
And phosphorus and francium and fluorine and terbium,
And manganese and mercury, molybdenum, magnesium,
Dysprosium and scandium and cerium and cesium.
And lead, praseodymium and platinum, plutonium,
Palladium, promethium, potassium, polonium,
And tantalum, technetium, titanium, tellurium,
And cadmium and calcium and chromium and curium.
There's sulfur, californium and fermium, berkelium,
And also mendelevium, einsteinium, nobelium,
And argon, krypton, neon, radon, xenon, zinc and rhodium,
And chlorine, carbon, cobalt, copper, tungsten, tin and sodium.
These are the only ones of which the news has come to Harvard,
And there may be many others but they haven't been discovered.
The Elements is a song written by Tom Lehrer in 1959, it is a cleverly crafted celebration of the chemical elements. The song is composed of singing the name of each chemical element in order according to their periodic table position. Lehrer presents the list of elements in a lively manner with an accompaniment on the piano. Each verse or segment consists of listing out elements, with each element having exactly one syllable, as they are sang in order.
The lyrics of this song reflect the scientific knowledge and interest of the time, as rearranging elements and understanding chemical reactions was still a nascent subject. They also reflect Lehrer's wit and humor, as well as his gift for songwriting. In addition to the song's entertainment value, it also serves as a valuable resource in memorizing the periodic table. The song has remained a popular and enduring tribute to the periodic table and its elements.
Line by Line Meaning
There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium,
This world has antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium.
And hydrogen and oxygen and nitrogen and rhenium,
There are hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and rhenium too.
And nickel, neodymium, neptunium, germanium,
Nickel, neodymium, neptunium, and germanium are also present.
And iron, americium, ruthenium, uranium,
We can count iron, americium, ruthenium, and uranium.
Europium, zirconium, lutetium, vanadium,
Europium, zirconium, lutetium, and vanadium are four elements known to man.
And lanthanum and osmium and astatine and radium,
Other elements include lanthanum, osmium, astatine, and radium.
And gold, protactinium and indium and gallium,
You can discover gold, protactinium, indium, and gallium.
And iodine and thorium and thulium and thallium.
As well as iodine, thorium, thulium, and thallium.
There's yttrium, ytterbium, actinium, rubidium,
Yttrium, ytterbium, actinium, and rubidium exist alongside.
And boron, gadolinium, niobium, iridium,
Boron, gadolinium, niobium, and iridium add up to the list.
There's strontium and silicon and silver and samarium,
Ali metallurgist ki nazar me strontium, silicon, silver, aur samarium hai.
And bismuth, bromine, lithium, beryllium, and barium.
Bismuth, bromine, lithium, beryllium, and barium are also present.
There's holmium and helium and hafnium and erbium,
We cannot forget holmium, helium, hare, and erbium.
And phosphorus and francium and fluorine and terbium,
Phosphorus, francium, fluorine, and terbium can also be found.
And manganese and mercury, molybdenum, magnesium,
Elements like manganese, mercury, molybdenum, and magnesium are also worth battling.
Dysprosium and scandium and cerium and cesium.
Last but not least, we have dysprosium, scandium, cerium, and cesium.
And lead, praseodymium and platinum, plutonium,
Don't forget about lead, praseodymium, platinum, and plutonium.
Palladium, promethium, potassium, polonium,
Palladium, promethium, potassium, and polonium are a part of this.
And tantalum, technetium, titanium, tellurium,
To make it longer, we can consider tantalum, technetium, titanium, and tellurium.
And cadmium and calcium and chromium and curium.
There is also a mixture of cadmium, calcium, chromium, and curium.
There's sulfur, californium and fermium, berkelium,
Some other elements include sulfur, californium, fermium, and berkelium.
And also mendelevium, einsteinium, nobelium,
Moreover, you can find mendelevium, einsteinium, and nobelium in this world.
And argon, krypton, neon, radon, xenon, zinc and rhodium,
Argon, krypton, neon, radon, xenon, zinc, and rhodium are alive and well.
And chlorine, carbon, cobalt, copper, tungsten, tin and sodium.
How can we forget about chlorine, carbon, cobalt, copper, tungsten, tin, and sodium?
These are the only ones of which the news has come to Harvard,
These are the elements discovered and known, Harvard confirms.
And there may be many others but they haven't been discovered.
There might be many newer elements, but we still did not find them yet.
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: DANIEL TENAGLIA
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@v_once1523
0:54 - 0:55 Lanthanides completed ✅
0:57 - 0:58 Metalloids completed ✅
0:59 - 1:00 Alkaline Earth Metals completed ✅
1:08 - 1:09 Noble Gases completed ✅
1:09 - 1:10 Halogens completed ✅
1:09 - 1:10 Other Nonmetals completed ✅
1:11 Other Metals completed ✅
1:11 - 1:12 Alkali Metals completed ✅
1:19 - 1:20 Actinides completed ✅
1:20 Transition Elements completed ✅
1:21 Unknown Elements completed ✅
@colinanderson760
I would make a pun, but all the good ones Argon.
@lawliman15
That's such an overused and Carbon Radium Phosphorus Phosphorus Yttrium joke.
@Funkykitsune
lawliman15 Hehehe
@aeralix9423
+lawliman15 Q: What do you do with a sick chemist?
A: If you can't helium, and you can't curium, you should probably just barium.
@jadeshiota784
I would tell you a joke about sodium but NA
Are you full of helium yet?
@aeralix9423
Naruto Uzamaki Gold walks into a bar. The bartender shouts, "AU! Get outta here!"
@stephenbarringer235
My father used to win bets in college with this song. He would bet that he could recite the entire periodic table, and when people scoffed and bet he couldn't, he'd launch into this song (which as an actor and musician from childhood he'd found easy to memorize). Usually he didn't have to get more than halfway before the other person would give up. 😆
@DPA_YT_24
I memorized this whole song myself, Dysprosium, Chlorine & Carbon weren’t easy to memorise, but I got there at some point
@pedrosso0
What about... In order? >:D
@bronsonstrange3827
How long ago was that? This song has been so widely shared, I genuinely don't know when it was first created.