I recently attended a sportsball game for the first time in years and it was quite the hypersensory experience. Yankee Stadium hit different. The musical score of the game wasn’t limited to a Hammond organ played live from the organist’s nest (right beside the sniper’s nest). Now the Yankees music director has a whole soundboard full of samples at his disposal.
There were the old standbys like “Charge!” and “De-fense!”, the familiar “S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y” claps and “We Will Rock You” stomps, but most of the soundtrack was filled out with 15-second clips of modern pop music, as if controlled by an iPad kid on shuffle mode. The stadium volume, like modern movie theaters, was tinnitus-inducing.
One particular melody stuck out, an ancient earworm from Long Island.
The P.C. Richards “Whistle” is played for every away team strike-out. It brings a smile to us Gen X boomers in the stands. We can’t help but think of the jingle, subvocalizing the lyrics, “At P.C. Richards.” I’m not sure if this store chain even exists, but the posthumous jingle plays on, a bluesy mix of thirds that resolves on a G.
When the Yankees strike out however, there is only silence and despair. Fathers cry into helmets filled with melted cheese. Mothers clutch their jersey-swaddled infants. Zoomers hold their broccoli heads and ask God, “Why, dawg?”
The “Whistle” was written by VO artist Leer Leary. How nice it must be to have written an immortal melody! The Mets started copying the Yankees and using the whistle for their strike-outs. On a long enough timeline, nobody will remember the lyrics to P.C. Richards, and the whistle will be associated with scalawags whiffing.
So here’s to you, Leer Leary, my king. As jingles go, the whistle is nonpareil. It’s right up there with “Take Me Out to The Ballgame” and Mattingly’s moustache.
