Edinburgh Fringe 2024
Another Unwasted Evening – The Genius of Tom Lehrer
Antony (Dr H) Hubmayer
Genre: Cabaret, Live Music
Venue: artSpace@St.Mark’s
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
Australian showman Antony (Dr H) Hubmayer is a master pianist, storyteller, comedian, and historian. He combines all of those skills into a truly delightful hour of recounting some of the hits of brilliant creative genius that is Tom Lehrer.
Review
Australian showman Antony (Dr H) Hubmayer is a master pianist, storyteller, comedian, and historian. He combines all of those skills into a truly delightful hour of recounting some of the hits of brilliant creative genius that is Tom Lehrer.
Lehrer is an American singer-songwriter, satirist, highly accomplished pianist, and mathematician. Born in 1928, he grew up in Manhattan. He was a child prodigy on piano but equally gifted in maths, studying at Harvard at just 14 years old. His career began in the 1950s with a satirical show and album. He toured Australia in 1960. He came to prominence on the American political satire TV show “That Was The Week That Was”, spawned by the BBC original. ‘Who’s Next?’. He recorded more albums, but stopped live performance in the 1970s. In 1996 he was part of a Broadway show produced by Cameron Mackintosh, one of the most prolific producers of musicals in history. His tunes are classic and live on through interpretations by Hubmayer and others.
Antony Hubmayer/Dr. H (yes, he actually has a PhD) is clearly captivated by the work of Lehrer. He has chosen a range of Lehrer’s extensive body of work to bring to life in a very funny and entertaining hour of singing and piano playing.
Dr. H definitely has the skills. He is a fabulous pianist who glides across the keys with ease and confidence. He has mastered the often Ragtime-influenced stylings of Lehrer. He is lively, clever, very funny, and a terrific singer.
The show opens with “Be Prepared” and he tells his audience to, in fact, be prepared for this evening of political and possibly inappropriate songs. Throughout the concert, we are reminded to be prepared. The audience is fully engaged in singing along. He calls for Eurovision Rules, where the audience must participate in signaling musical key changes with hands in the air and a cheer.
Lehrer combined his interest logic, math and science in the song “The Elements”. It is a tongue-twister listing all 102 of the elements of the periodic table set to the comic tune of “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General” from the Gilbert and Sullivan opera “Pirates of Penzance”. Not only does Dr. H totally master the rapid-fire lines but he has cleverly added more content for the 16 new elements discovered since the song was originally penned.
In the “Irish Ballad”, Dr. He sings of the story of a mischievous handmaiden who was, in fact, a killer. Of course the audience must sing along with the “rickety tickety tin” chorus.
“National Brotherhood Week” was declared by the US government, so Lehrer took the opportunity to satirically point out that everyone hated everyone else. Dr. H updates the tune to include references to Trump and Harris, and to the Scottish and Irish.
New Math was a dramatic but temporary change in the way mathematics was taught in American grade schools from the 1950s to the 1970s. It was particularly confusing to parents, who understood the traditional methods of calculations. Dr. H demonstrates the technique on a small chart, then handily performs Lehrer’s song “New Math”.
Dr. H sings the rousing ballad “Wernher von Braun” about the US rocket scientist who was a former member of the Nazi party. Von Braun was hired by NASA to as a key engineer in the US Apollo space program.
There are other memorable tunes, but the finale was the requisite “Vatican Rag”. Played in ragtime style and impeccably interpreted by Dr. H, the song is a send-up of Catholic traditions.
Dr. H is clearly a fan of the creative genius of Tom Lehrer. He has studied the work, interprets it with gusto, and perfectly replicates the piano parts. Dr. H has an honours degree in classical piano performance and regularly tours his cabaret shows. He is a high school teacher in Adelaide. I can just imagine the fun and wild adventures in his classroom. He brings unending energy and enthusiasm to this fantastic project, honouring one of the greatest American satirical songwriters of the 20th century. It is a night to remember. You will leave singing and smiling.
