Good Music, Good Fun, Good Science

THE BIOCHEMISTS’ SONGBOOK Cassette Tape. Harold Baum. Pergamon Press, Elmsford NY, 1983. $11. Songbook. Pergamon Press, 1982. 62 pp. $6.50. In the UK, Taylor & Francis, Rankine Road, Basingstoke, Hants RG24 OPR. There’s no doubt about it; Harold Baum is a phenomenon of modem day biology and biochemistry education. He authored the original Biochemists’ Songbook, which was published in 1982 with a charming introduction by Sir Hans Krebs. Then in 1984 Biorhythms 1 and Biorhythms 2 appeared, with words by Baum and music by Peter Shade. These teaching packages each consist of an audio tape and a booklet containing words, music and clear explanatory notes covering many aspects of introductory biology. The taped version of Baum’s earlier biochemistry book, arranged by Peter Shade and sung by Gary Bond, caught up with me while I was at a workshop for information scientists and bioscientists. I arranged for an evening concert with refreshments including a common two-carbon compound. We sat around listening to the delightful tape, which develops major aspects of introductory biochemistry sung to the tunes of well-known melodies. Examples are “Waltz Round the Cycle” done to “Waltzing Matilda” and “The Pentose Phosphate Shunt" sung to "Macnamara's Band." It's difficult to select a favorite but my vote for number one goes to “Beta-Oxidation” sung to the tune of “There is a Tavern in the Town.” “Protein Biosynthesis” takes 11 minutes— 660 seconds of the music of “My Bonnie” grew a wee bit tedious. After listening, it seemed the only way to review this tape properly would be in kind, and I began to intone, off key the following: If someday it may happen That a student will be found Baum’s got a little list He’s got a tuneful list Of metabolic processes That are absolutely sound And which always would be missed Always would be missed There's the intermediate sequences Which end in ATP And cycles which go roundly by And schemes that look like Z Baum’s got them on his list He’s got them on his list. After this musical introduction, I want to assure the reader (listener) that Baum, professor of biochemistry at Ch College, University of London, presents the science on this tape with care and precision. “The Micbaelis Anthem” derives the Michaelis-Menten equation for the velocity of enzymatic reactions with elegance and compactness. Strangely the tune to this piece is listed in The Biochemists’ Songbook’s cover material as the doctrinaire 1930s song “The Red Flag” rather than the earlier and better known “Tannenbaum.” Are we getting a political statement? “The Chemiosmotic Theory” to the tune of “The Eton Boating Song” gives a very balanced treatment of a difficult and still somewhat controversial topic. The audience for this tape is everyone who either has hated or loved learning the details of biochemistry, as well as students whose burdens will be lightened by a tuneful path through 1,000-page introductory textbooks. I played the tape for Consuelo Sanudo, an assistant music librarian at St. John’s College in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She tells me that its vocalist has excellent diction, the renditions are crisp and eloquent and the arrangements ar appropriate to the material. But enough of formal musical analysis. This tape is good music, good fun and good science. Who can ask for anything more? Morowitz is professor of molecular biophysics and biochemistry at Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520. His most recent book, Cosmic Joy and Local Pain (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1987), was reviewed in THE SCIENTIST, September 21, 1987, p.20, and excerpted October 19, 1987, p. 24.

Good Music, Good Fun, Good Science

THE BIOCHEMISTS’ SONGBOOK

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