Wednesday, October 14, 2009

An Now for the Element Song!



"The Elements" (1959) is a song by musical humorist Tom Lehrer, which recites the names of all the chemical elements known at the time of writing, up to number 102, nobelium. It can be found on his albums Tom Lehrer in concert, "More Songs by Tom Lehrer" and "An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer". The song is sung to the tune of the "Major General's Song" from "The Pirates of Penzance' by Gilbert and Sullivan. Very funny! And amazing to realize that as of 2006, the table contains 117 chemical elements whose discoveries have been confirmed. Ninety-four are found naturally on Earth, and the rest are synthetic elements that have been produced artificially in particle accelerators.

3 comments:

Kirsten said...

Have you seen the new They Might Be Giants Here Comes Science DVD? It's great. My kids beg to watch it. Here's a link to listen to some song snipits, but the video that comes with it is just as engaging.

http://www.amazon.com/Here-Comes-Science-Might-Giants/dp/B002FKZ4UO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1255550147&sr=8-1

My 6 yr old loves the " The Bloodmobile" and now we have dinner conversation about whether the sun is a gas or a plasma. My 4 yr old loves "How Many Planets?" and if she learns all the planets in order and why Pluto isn't a planet anymore, that's great!

Cerebration said...

Love that, Kirsten!! Thanks for sharing...

SongCue said...

...this is probably the most G-Rated of Tom Lehrer's wonderful satire! What a genius. For a GREAT time, look him up on I-Tunes!