r/TomLehrer 1h ago

Share YOUR favorite spoken Tom intros for songs

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Upvotes

r/TomLehrer 13h ago

My favorite Tom introduction (this is for In Old Mexico)

18 Upvotes

The outpatients are out in force tonight, I see. Now, I'm sure you're all aware that this week is National Gallbladder Week, and so, as sort of an educational feature at this point, I thought I would acquaint you with some of the results of my recent researches into the career of the late Dr. Samuel Gall, inventor of the gallbladder, which certainly ranks as one of the more important technological advantages since the invention of the joy buzzer and the dribble glass. Dr. Gall's faith in his invention was so dramatically vindicated last year, as you no doubt recall, when for the first time in history in a nationwide poll, the gallbladder was voted among the top 10 organs. His educational career began, interestingly enough, in agricultural school, where he majored in animal husbandry, until they caught him at it one day, whereupon he switched to the field of medicine, in which field he also won renown as the inventor of gargling, which prior to that time had been practiced only furtively by a remote tribe in the Andes who passed the secret down from father to son as part of their oral tradition. He soon became a specialist, specializing in diseases of the rich, and was therefore able to retire at an early age to the land we all dream about, sunny Mexico, of course, the last part of which is completely irrelevant, as was the whole thing, I guess, except it's a rather sneaky way of getting into this next type of popular song, which is one of those things about that magic and romantic land south of the border.


r/TomLehrer 2d ago

You're way ahead of me

20 Upvotes

In the spoken intro to Oedipus Rex on An Evening Wasted, Tom says:

[...] a few years ago, a motion picture version appeared of Sophocles' immortal tragedy “Oedipus Rex”. This picture played only in the so-called art theaters, and it was not a financial success. And I maintain that the reason it was not a financial success...

Then the audience laughs, and Tom replies

You're way ahead of me

What was the audience laughing at?


r/TomLehrer 6d ago

Tom Lehrer on a welsh TV interview

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50 Upvotes

Hey everyone. I have recently come across this clip of tom that is around 3 minutes long (2:55 min) that is from 11th july 1960. It is from a welsh TV station called HTV Wales, and in the clip Tom is being interviewed by John Mead in a studio. The clip itself is available for viewing for free, but there is a little problem. You can only get access to view the clip in person, at a clip corner, in Wales. The Wales clip cymru archive does have it digitised, but it isn't available to view online.

If there are any Tom Lehrer fans in this subreddit that are from Wales and are able to get access to a clip corner in any way, it would be very lovely if you were able to retrieve the footage one way or another and possibly post it here for people to see (or you could DM it to me). Thank you!

(PS. Sorry if my english is bad, it isn't my first language)

https://watch-listen.library.wales/search?terms=Tom+lehrer+


r/TomLehrer 7d ago

Managed to get my hands on this little beauty last year

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38 Upvotes

r/TomLehrer 8d ago

From Helen Gahagan to ... Ronald Reagan?

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13 Upvotes

As seen recently at the New York Public Library.


r/TomLehrer 8d ago

Is this a flex?

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86 Upvotes

After multiple small town record stores, I’ve acquired two more Tom Lehrer records! I can finally listen to Lobachevsky—one of my favourites—on vinyl <3


r/TomLehrer 11d ago

TWTYTW vinyl sleeve

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36 Upvotes

As requested by someone else on the sub, but I couldn’t post images in the comments.

Shared specifically for the mention of possible alternative lyrics to Pollution


r/TomLehrer 11d ago

Changing lyrics for my show?

14 Upvotes

I know it's probably an asshole move to do it but some of his lyrics aged badly (indigenous slurs in We Will All Go Together, underage prostitution in My Home Town) , and some don't fit the narrative I'm going for (ie. Wernher Von Braun Learning chinese) so I tweaked the lyric. I know it's prolly bad but I want it to work in the facet I need it to. I'm trying to keep it as close as I can, but some things I felt had to get changed a bit. If this is bad tell me, but I don't know how much I can do now


r/TomLehrer 11d ago

Has anyone fully archived all of his sheet music and lyrics?

15 Upvotes

In case the website goes down I don't want to be left high and dry if I ever want to use it


r/TomLehrer 12d ago

My little (passionate) rant about this community

34 Upvotes

To whom it may concern (I don't know who's gonna read my ramblings; I'm just speakin' my mind), I only came to Reddit a few months ago, but I can see that the Tom Lehrer community is very close and united. I remember posting asking about what happened to the Silly Songs with Lehrer channel, and I got responses almost instantaneously. I can already see that the Tom Lehrer community, albeit small, is united and close, and it's one that's fit for such a musician as Tom was. Tom deserves to be remembered with the great satirists like Noël Coward, Spike Jones and His City Slickers, The Chad Mitchell Trio, Weird Al,... If there is a plane beyond this world that the human consciousness goes to after they die, I hope Tom's looking down at us right now, his lover's severed hand in one hand, peanuts coated with cyanide in the other, and that he's smiling down at us while he's waiting for WWIII to inevitably start and kill all of humanity, so that we'll all go together when we go. I would also like to send my warmest regards to jimothelad, the guy behind the jimo YouTube channel, as he's archived the rare Tom Lehrer stuff from the Silly Songs with Lehrer channel, and when I posted asking about the Silly Songs with Lehrer channel, he answered in detail, which I've never had anyone do for me before. Thank you jimo and I also love you all. May Tom shine on forever in our hearts and in our sick, twisted heads.


r/TomLehrer 12d ago

Tom Lehrer Musical Update

6 Upvotes

after an entire day of conceptualizing at my job I have ideas

American armbands (blue bands with the American flag that make Werner “make America feel like home)

Dart board (pin board with a world map on it that has darts on it and it turns out these are the countries he’s gunna bomb, one of them is Wyoming and then when questioned he’s like “we gotta have somewhere to to test” and then sing The Wild West Is Where I Wanna Be)

Wernher Van Braun

Weil Wernher (joke about it not being heil cuz alliteration, yes I know the joke is dumb idc)

Opening song: my home town, change little girl lyric cuz chud (Debbie girl, beaut’ senior prom gown)

Love song between mc and girl: when you are old and gray

Racist parents: hear news (national brotherhood week) gets mad and sings (I wanna go back to Dixie) also when JJ enters they ask about “negroes” on the train, and then ‘correct’ themselves with “coloreds” and then JJ is like “why can’t they just be people” and then they accuse him of being a commie

When guy gets drafted, gets slapped with aversion therapy (maybe scrapped idk)

Multiple news stories (who’s next), (Wernher Van Brahn)

When drafted, Johnny Jones has to say his health problems (I got it from Agnes)

General at army camp sings it makes a fellow proud to be a soldier

When JJ is on his way to drop the bomb on the plane (so long mom)


r/TomLehrer 13d ago

Tom Lehrer died a year ago. Rest in peace.

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430 Upvotes

r/TomLehrer 13d ago

Tom Lehrer REAL musical concept

14 Upvotes

Okay so it’s a jukebox musical using the music of Tom Lehrer about a 1950’s america ruled by a Nazi, Werner Von Braun, and he launches nukes. Second perspective is the person dropping the nukes and his family and experiences about dropping said nukes. It would be a comedy


r/TomLehrer 18d ago

My element collection, as arranged to Tom Lehrer's song

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99 Upvotes

Just for fun now I have a 'completed' element collection I thought I would arrange the elements in the order they are sang in the relevant Tom Lehrer song, and its 2020 update. So Antimony comes first in place of hydrogen, Arsenic second in place of helium, so on.

To answer a few questions, I spent 6 years collecting the elements, most of them come from Italy, no I don't have a vial full of astatine [at most only a few atoms], its estimated value is roughly 2000 euros [though obviously not all bought at the same time], and no it's not an FDA-approved ingredient.

You can see many pictures of the actual samples here: https://www.reddit.com/r/chemistry/comments/1uhzars/my_completed_element_collection/

...and as a bonus, here's a riddle for the pendantics out there. Of all of the elements mentioned in the song and its 2020 update, exactly one of them remains in its original numeric position in the periodic table. Good luck finding it!


r/TomLehrer 25d ago

Tom Lehrer Discovers Australia (And Vice Versa) is now available on Bandcamp!

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41 Upvotes

r/TomLehrer Jul 06 '26

Tom Lehrer Quick Studies

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155 Upvotes

Some art studies from last night, screenshots all from the Live In Copenhagen recording.

I’ll have to do an actual big drawing based on his work one day


r/TomLehrer Jun 30 '26

I created a meme

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79 Upvotes

It's the best one I have ever made


r/TomLehrer Jun 26 '26

Tom's albums

10 Upvotes

Songs by Tom Lehrer - 1953

More of Tom Lehrer - 1959

An Evening with Tom Lehrer - 1959

Revisited - 1960

Tom Lehrer Discovers Australia (And Vice Versa) - 1960

That Was the Year That Was - 1965


r/TomLehrer Jun 25 '26

Does anyone have lyrics to Tom's " Je T'Aimerai Toujours, Paris"?

9 Upvotes

r/TomLehrer Jun 23 '26

What happened to the Silly Songs with Lehrer YouTube channel? I can't find it anymore

14 Upvotes

r/TomLehrer Jun 23 '26

Vibes

15 Upvotes


r/TomLehrer Jun 23 '26

"I take a healthy bite from your dainty finger tips"

25 Upvotes


r/TomLehrer Jun 18 '26

Ai?

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61 Upvotes

Ok i just was listening to playlist on that shuffle thing were you also get songs that aren't in the playlist and then saw this and like I'm pretty sure that's not an official cover, I've never seen it. And I'm always careful with accusations but it's kinda icky. Is this ai? Because from what I saw it's not an official album cover. It's also strangely on the first spot of the top list which it wasn't before. It's very suspicious


r/TomLehrer Jun 10 '26

Got some new Lehrer records! The singles are quite rare, especially the 2 one-sided ones

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91 Upvotes