Tom Lehrer, influential satirical singer-songwriter, dies aged 97

Tom Lehrer, the highly influential American satirist and singer-songwriter, has died at the age of 97.

Variety have reported that Lehrer’s friends say he was found dead in his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts on Saturday (July 26).

He was widely recognised for his incisive, darkly comedic songs that targeted the politics and society of ‘50s and ‘60s American life, and he has been cited as a key influence on the work of the likes of Randy Newman, ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic and The Simpsons.

After establishing himself on the underground beatnik circuit in the 1950s, he rose to greater prominence with his regular contributions to NBC’s That Was The Week That Was, the US spin-off of the landmark David Frost-fronted BBC satirical show.

Lehrer was comfortable challenging social taboos of the day in his songs, including drug addiction (‘The Old Dope Peddler’), militant patriotism (‘It Makes A Fellow Proud To Be A Soldier’), nuclear proliferation (‘So Long Mom’) and sexuality (‘The Masochism Tango’).

Born in New York on April 9, 1928, he began playing piano at a young age and was accepted into Harvard at the age of 15. While studying for a doctorate in mathematics in the early ‘50s, he recorded his debut album ‘Songs Of Tom Lehrer’ in 1953, which became a cult hit in the Boston area and sold 10,000 copies.

He continued in higher education throughout his adult life, becoming a professor in mathematics at Harvard and later at UC Santa Cruz.

In 2022, Lehrer’s enduring legacy was revealed when Yankovic told NME that he decided that Daniel Radcliffe was the right man to play him in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story when he saw the Harry Potter star performing Lehrer’s ‘The Elements Song’ on The Graham Norton Show.

Lehrer never married and leaves no children.

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