Music Album Review: 'Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack Recording'

© 1994 The Baseball Project/PBS/Elektra Nonesuch

In our sun-down perambulations of late, through the outer parts of Brooklyn, we have observed several parties of youngsters playing ‘base,’ a certain game of ball…. Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our close rooms…. The game of ball is glorious. - Walt Whitman, 1846

On September 6, 1994 - at the height of that year's season-ending Major League Baseball players' strike - Elektra Nonesuch released Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack, a 31-track album featuring music and selected audio clips from Ken Burns' nine-part documentary about America's national pastime.

Featuring performances by Count Basie and His Orchestra, Carly Simon, Dr. John, Natalie Cole, Lester Young (with Count Basie), Les Brown, the Big League Orchestra, Jacqueline Schwab, Betty Bonney, Harvey Hindemeyer, Duke Ellington, Mabel Scott, Branford Marsalis, and many more, Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack is a time machine that takes listeners on a whirlwind trip through the long, storied history of baseball from its inception in the 1840s all the way to the early 1990s.

Following the blueprint of Elektra Nonesuch's 1990 soundtrack album for The Civil War: A Film by Ken Burns, producers Ken Burns, John Colby, and Lynn Novick give listeners and baseball buffs a 31-track sampler comprised of baseball-related songs (Take Me Out to the Ball Game, Hurrah For Our National Game, Joltin' Joe DiMaggio, Say Hey (The Willie Mays Song), and several variations of The Star-Spangled Banner), along with snippets of radio broadcasts and readings by actors such as Amy Madigan and Ossie Davis.


It is an epic overflowing with heroes and hopefuls, scoundrels and screwballs. It is a saga spanning the quest for racial justice, the clash of labor and management, and the unfolding of popular culture and the national pastime. It is the history of a nation at work and play. Now viewers caught humming the tunes after watching Ken Burns' Baseball can experience the music and historical quotes from the film on this original soundtrack recording. - Promotional blurb, ShopPBS.org

Carly Simon: Take Me Out to the Ballgame (Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns version)

Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack Recording Track List

1 –Garrison Keilor* Walt Whitman (Quote) 0:48

2 –Jacqueline Schwab Take Me Out To The Ball Game 1:34

3 –The Big League Orchestra The Star-Spangled Banner 1:30

4 –Jacqueline Schwab Hurrah For Our National Game 1:16

5 –Harvey Hindermyer Take Me Out To The Ball Game 2:04

6 –Dodworth Saxhorn Band Gee, It's A Wonderful Game 2:48

7 –Ossie Davis Sol White (Quote From History Of Colored Baseball) / Dark Was The Night, Cold Was The Ground 1:01

8 –Bobby Horton Steal Away 2:10

9 –Babe Ruth (2) Babe Ruth Radio Call (1927) 0:17

10 –The New York Hawks Club House Stomp 1:30

11 –The National Pastime Orchestra If You Can't Make A Hit At A BallGame, You Can't Make A Hit With Me 3:27

12 –Lester Young With Count Basie And His Orchestra* Pound Cake 2:43

13 –Jacqueline Schwab The Minstrel Boy 1:37

14 –Red Barber Joe DiMaggio Radio Call 0:23

15 –Les Brown and His Orchestra Featuring Betty Bonney Joltin' Joe DiMaggio 2:51

16 –Ossie Davis Kansas City Call (Quote) 0:44

17 –Jacqueline Schwab The Star-Spangled Banner 1:16

18 –Duke Ellington The New Black-And-Tan Fantasy 2:40

19 –Bob Wolff Jackie Robinson Radio Call (1956) 0:22

20 –Natalie Cole Did You See Jackie Robinson Hit That Ball? 2:57

21 –Mabel Scott Baseball Boogie 2:46

22 –Russ Hodges Bobby Thompson's Shot Heard 'Round The World 1:24

23 –King Curtis Take Me Out To The Ball Game 2:07

24 –The Treniers Say Hey (The Willie Mays Song) 3:09

25 –George Rabbai Take Me Out To The Ball Game 1:01

26 –M. Hamilton (3) With Jacqueline Schwab And Studs Terkel Henry Aaron Radio Call / When You And I Were Young Maggie / The New York Times (Quote) 2:09

27 –Dr. John Take Me Out To The Ball Game 2:51

28 –Reverend Jessie Jackson* With Jacqueline Schwab Eulogy For Jackie Robinson / Steal Away 2:07

29 –Carly Simon Take Me Out To The Ball Game 2:52

30 –Amy Madigan The Sporting News (Quote) 0:35

31 –Branford Marsalis and Bruce Hornsby The Star-Spangled Banner 2:18

My Take

Because Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns is such a massive production (with the 2011 The Tenth Inning supplement, it has a running time of 1,380 minutes), to present all of the music heard in the award-winning documentary would have required a large (and expensive) box set similar to the later Jazz soundtrack. At the very least, Elektra Nonesuch might have needed to release three or four separate CDs, each devoted to a certain time period or genre, as Sony's Legacy label did with 2007's The War: A Ken Burns Film's soundtrack.

Instead, album Burns, Colby, and Novick chose to follow the simpler and - for the consumer - more affordable path blazed four years earlier by The Civil War; Original Soundtrack Recording. As in that 1990 classic, the Baseball soundtrack gives the listener a taste of the larger audio banquet to be had within the documentary itself.

Interestingly, two songs, in particular, are presented by different artists in different musical styles: Take Me Out to the Ball Game by Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer and The Star-Spangled Banner by Francis Scott Key (lyrics) and John Stafford Smith (music).

Take Me Out to the Ball Game is heard six times; first as a piano solo by Jacqueline Schwab, then in a 1908 recording by Harvey Hindermayer. The song is reprised in different styles (trumpet solo, jazz, pop, and rock) by George Rabbai, King Curtis, Carly Simon, and Dr. John.

The Star-Spangled Banner, which wasn't yet the national anthem when it was first played at baseball games circa 1914, is played three times in Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack Recording. 

The first time we hear it (on Track 3), it is played "straight" by the Big League Orchestra. Later, on Track 17, Jacqueline Schwab performs it as a piano solo, which gives it a lovely and wistful emotional twist. Finally, The Star-Spangled Banner is used to close the album in a piano/saxophone arrangement by Bruce Hornsby and Branford Marsalis.

In addition, there are songs written to celebrate individual ballplayers' achievements, including Joltin' Joe DiMaggio, Did You See Jackie Robinson Hit That Ball? (performed beautifully in a cover version by Natalie Cole), and The Treniers' Say Hey (The Willie Mays Song).

If you've read my ongoing series of reviews about Baseball; A Film by Ken Burns (I still have several episodes to review as of this writing), you know that even though I'm no baseball buff, I enjoyed this amazing and immersive film project. Burns' understanding and love of music and how it enhances a documentary are key elements of his documentaries' critical and popular acclaim, and this album is Exhibit A.

Although Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack Recording is the tip of the iceberg, musically speaking, as far as the musical content from the original nine-part series, it's still a fun album to listen to. The music reflects the long history of the game via the use of different genres, ranging from the early 1900's Tin Pan Alley-style performances to late 20th Century pop and jazz renditions of Take Me Out to the Ball Game and the national anthem.

So if you're a die-hard baseball fan or just like a taste of American music from various historical periods and performed in different styles, Baseball: A Film by Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack Recording is a must-have addition for your record collection.