The Biochemists' Songbook MP3 Files

This page contains links to MP3 files with recorded versions of songs from The Biochemists' Songbook, by Harold Baum.  Dr. Baum was a professor at Chelsea College of the University of London who composed a biochemical song each year for his departmental Christmas party.  A collection of these songs was published in 1982 by Pergamon Press, along with a cassette tape with professional recordings of the songs.

A second edition of the book, containing several new songs, was published by Taylor and Francis in the UK and CRC Press in the US in 1995 and is still available.  Dr. Baum was then at King's College, University of London.

The tape is no longer available, and Taylor and Francis informed me that the copyright had reverted to Dr. Baum, who is now retired from teaching but still involved in research at King's College.  When I asked for permission to convert the tape tracks to MP3 for use in my lectures and for downloading by my students, he graciously consented.  When I then asked whether I might post the MP3 files on a publicly available web site, he was delighted to give his permission for that as well, so that I could do this "as a pro bono gesture to students elsewhere."

I know that the lyrics to some of these songs have been posted on various web sites, and you can probably find them by googling around, but, in respect of copyright laws, especially since the book is still available, I will not post them here. 

Jeff Cohlberg, Professor (cohlberg@csulb.edu)         

Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry

California State University, Long Beach

June 2006

The performances on the tape were produced and arranged by Peter Shade, MPRS, MCPS, AGAC (I don't know what these mean, but it all looks pretty impressive) and recorded by Tidytones Limited.  Gary Bond was the singer, with Brian Lemon on piano, Peter Shade on synthesisers, piano, vibes and flute, Michael Salmons on clarinet, saxophone and violin, Alan Ganley on drums, and Brian Barnes on backup vocals.  Thanks to Walter Gajewski from Academic Computing Services at CSULB for doing the MP3 conversions.

Here are the MP3 files: