Tributes paid to satirical genius

Tributes have been paid to musical satirist Tom Lehrer, following his death at 97.

He started writing music while a maths undergraduate at Harvard in the 1940s and although he had a relatively short career in the following two decades, he was – and remains – hugely influential. 

By his own estimate, he performed just 109 shows and wrote 37 songs over 20 years before returning to a life in academia, but many of them have become classics. His most famous are probably The Elements, a list of the chemical elements set to the tune of Gilbert and Sullivan’s I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General,  The Masochism Tango and the darkly funny Poisoning Pigeons In The Park.

Lehrer’s friend, David Herder, confirmed the news of his death to the New York Times.

His 1953 album Songs by Tom Lehrer sold an estimated 500,000 copies, all via mail order, leading to his career in the alternative nightclubs in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

He also wrote songs for the US edition of the satirical British show That Was the Week That Was, and regularly featured in producer David Frost’s follow-up The Frost Report in the UK.

Many of his songs were banned by broadcasters, with his most controversial being the Vatican Rag,  which mocked Catholic rituals.

He gave up performing in 1967, but his songs remained popular - with a 1980 West End revue of his songs called Tomfoolery finding a new audience.  In 1998, Lehrer performed in public for the first time in 18 years as part of a London tribute to Cameron Mackintosh, who had produced Tomfoolery.

He said he quit because he found audiences had become too earnest, saying: ‘My purpose was to make people laugh and not applaud. If the audience applauds, they’re just showing they agree with me.’

However, he also famously quipped that he was redundant as ‘political satire became obsolete when Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize’.

Writing on X tonight, Rory Bremner called Lehrer a ‘brilliant satirist, lyricist, inspiration’ adding that ‘let us update his songs more than once on the Bremner, Bird & Fortune shows. So, generous and a gentleman too. RIP a great man.’

Indeed in 2020, he relinquished his copyright so everyone could use his works. 

David Baddiel tonight called him ‘amazingly funny and ahead of his time’.

And Mitch Benn – who is presenting a tribute show to Lehrer’s work at  the Edinburgh Fringe – posted on BlueSky: ‘I’ve always acknowledged the incalculable debt I owe Tom Lehrer... I’m sad it’ll now be a eulogy rather than living tribute but it’ll be all the more heartfelt now he’s gone.’

 Randy Newman has previously said of Lehrer: ‘He’s one of the great American songwriters without a doubt…  As a lyricist, as good as there's been in the last half of the 20th century.’

Dillie Keane and ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic have acknowledged Lehrer’s influence on their work. Daniel Radcliffe was cast to play Yankovic in his spoof biopic after the musical comedian saw him perform The Elements on the Graham Norton Show.

Lehrer never married and leaves no children.  He once joked of his legacy:  'If, after hearing my songs, just one human being is inspired to say something nasty to a friend, or perhaps to strike a loved one, it will all have been worth the while.’

Published: 27 Jul 2025