An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer The lyrics of "The Elements" are a recitation of the names of all the chemical elements that were known at the time of writing, up to number 102, nobelium. It can be found on his albums "Songs & More Songs by Tom Lehrer" as well as "An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer". The song is sung to the tune of Sir Arthur Sullivan's "Major General's Song" ("I am the very model of a modern major-general...") from "The Pirates of Penzance". Since that time, 16 more have been discovered. At his concert in Copenhagen (1967), Lehrer admitted, "I like to play
The Elements (song) The ordering of elements in the lyrics fits the meter of the song, and includes much alliteration, and thus has little or no relation to the ordering in the periodic table. This can be seen for example in the opening and closing lines: <poem> Lehrer was a Harvard Mathematics lecturer, and the final rhyme of "Harvard" and "discovered" is delivered in a parody of a Boston accent—a non-rhotic manner—so that the two words rhyme. Lehrer did not normally speak with that accent. Lehrer accompanied himself on the piano while singing the song. Lehrer drew the inspiration for "The Elements" from