Tom Lehrer: The Tom Lehrer Collection [second DVD disc] (Shout! Factory)
Between the time I wrote my Pink Floyd blog post and now, I learned that Tom Lehrer died. Considering he was 97, this comes as little surprise.
Who is the greatest lyricist ever? I believe the question itself is flawed. How can we know who is the greatest at anything? Sometimes these things are measurable, but hardly in the arts. Best selling, yes. Greatest? A matter of opinion.
Who do I think is the greatest lyricist ever? I'm going with Tom.
I was griping in my previous posting about songwriters who don't have the basic mechanics of songwriting mastered: fitting the rhythm of the words to the meter of the song, stretching too far to make rhymes.
Tom had that down. He'd be the first to admit that musically he wasn't breaking new ground. All of his songs sound like jaunty, turn-of-the-century ditties. But that's where much of his humor lies: singing happy-sounding tunes with sarcastic, droll, or incredibly witty lyrics. And laugh-out-loud funny.
Tom self-released in 1953 his first 10" album, Songs by Tom Lehrer. Original copies have his PO box address on it. It must have been picked up for some distribution, because I understand it sold into six figures.
There's really only a handful of Lehrer records. He was far more invested in being a math (and later musical theater) professor at Harvard.
The majority of the DVD half of this release is a Copenhagen performance from 1967. There's Tom, relatively young, bespectacled, wavy hair pushed back, at the piano singing "The Masochism Tango", "The Vatican Rag", "Pollution", and "Poisoning Pigeons in the Park". So modest yet absolutely killing it.
The DVD includes four songs he wrote in the 1970s for The Electric Company, all very clever. There's also two songs he played in 1997 regarding math. Clocking in under a minute, "The Derivative Song" ranks with the best of any of his songs, and should be memorized by any first-year college student studying mathematics.
It was pretty recently, like weeks, that I read that Tom had placed all of his songs into public domain. How can I not love this man? I'm certain I would have totally fawned over him like a fanboy if I had met him. I'm certain he would have been polite and hated it.
When it comes down to it, what do we hope to do in this life? Make the world a better and more interesting place. At least that's my take. Tom was successful in that respect. We should all do so well.
No comments:
Post a Comment