Tom Lehrer, musical satirist, dies aged 97

Tom Lehrer, a well-known musical satirist and a noted mathematician, has passed away. He was 97.

According to The New York Times, his friend David Herder told the daily that his body was found in his house in Cambridge on Saturday.

The late musician's work became a hit in the 1950s and 1960s, characterized by humorously dark themes that took aim at politics, marriage, and racism.

Later, artists such as Randy Newman, Weird Al Yankovic, and Harry Shearer were influenced by his albums, including hit tracks The Elements and The Masochism Tango.

He also wrote biting satire for NBC's show That Was The Week That Was, or TW3, which surged his popularity.

However, Tom, who had studied piano since the age of 7, did not pursue music for long, as he was absorbed in his academic work, teaching students at Harvard, the University of California, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Variety reported he once told a member of an audience, “I don’t like people to get the idea that I have to do this for a living. I mean, it isn’t as though I had to do this. I could be making, oh, $3,000 a year just teaching.”

Born in Manhattan in 1928, Tom never married or had any children.