The term "sou", now obscure, was at the time common slang for a low-denomination coin. Carly Simon's version, produced for Ken Burns' 1994 documentary on baseball, reads "Ev'ry cent / Katie spent".
Modern renditions of the song
Nowadays the verses to the song are almost never heard, with only the chorus generally sung. It is commonly held to be the third most-often-played song in the United States, after "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "Happy Birthday to You".
Among those famously associated with the song was Hall of Fame sportscaster Harry Caray, who began singing at games in Comiskey Park for the Chicago White Sox from the early 1970s to 1981, then in Wrigley Field for the Chicago Cubs from 1982 through 1997. Caray's tradition of leading the crowd in singing the song began when White Sox owner Bill Veeck sneaked a public address microphone into Caray's broadcast booth, so that the crowd could hear's Caray's boundless enthusiasm and marginal musical talents — something that previously only his broadcast colleagues were privy to. After that, Caray began leading the crowd, leaning out the front window of his booth and swinging his microphone in time with the music. When Caray left Sox broadcasts to join the WGN team broadcasting Cubs games, the singing tradition went with him. Late in his career, when Caray missed a number of games due to a stroke, "guest conductors" did the honors; after Caray's death, the guest-conductor tradition continues, to this day.
(To historians and fans of the Cubs, there is a subtle irony that the year the song was written is the last year the Cubs won the World Series — after beating out Norworth's Giants for the league championship.)
When sung at baseball games, a variety of alternative version of lines are sung. For example, the line "never get back" is more often sung "ever get back" nowadays. Also, in most Major League ballparks, the line "Let me root, root, root for the home team", substitutes the actual name of the home team.
For example, on the South Side of Chicago, it is sung "Let me root, root, root for the White Sox". If the team name contains one syllable, the word "team" can be appended to the team name, or a two-syllable nickname can be used.
For other examples, at Cubs games, the line is sung "So it's root, root, root for the Cubbies," and at Cincinnati Reds games, it is sung "So it's root, root, root for our Reds team." However, at Minnesota Twins games, it is usually sung as the generic "home team", though often fans invoke the team's "alternate" nickname, and sing it as "Twinkies". Some teams replace the words "Let me" with either "So it's", "For it's", or "With a".
For other reasons, in Philadelphia, and at other baseball stadiums there such as the Citizens Bank Park, the words "root, root, root" are replaced with "toot, toot, toot", so now or then, the line is sung "Let me toot, toot, toot for the Phillies". All because the word "toot" rhymes with "root", the letter T replaces the letter R from its own syllable.
In the line "At the old ball game", the word "at" can be replaced with either "of" or "from" whatsoever, depending on which version the song is sung in. And, if appropriate, there is also translation of the famous song in many languages, such as French, and thus, the lyrics are listed here in a correct order:
Amène-moi au baseball,
Amène-moi dans la foule;
Achète-moi arachides et biscuits secs,
C'n'est pas grave si j'ne reviendrai pas.
Encourageons l'équipe locale,
S'ils ne gagnent pas c'est la honte;
C'est une, deux, trois prises, retraits au vieux jeu d'balle.
Recordings of the song
The song (or at least its chorus) has been recorded many times in the nearly 100 years since it was written. It has been used as an instrumental underscore or introduction to almost any film or skit having to do with baseball.
The first verse of the 1927 version is sung by Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra at the start of the 1949 musical film, Take Me Out to the Ballgame, a movie that also features a song about the famous and fictitious double play combination, O'Brien to Ryan to Goldberg.
In 1957, jazz pianists (and baseball fans) André Previn and Russ Freeman recorded Double Play! for Contemporary Records with drummer Shelly Manne. The original song titles invoke baseball imagery, such as "Called on Account of Rain," "In the Cellar Blues" and the title track. The first track on the album is a jazz version of "Take Me Out to the Ball Game."
One recording artist in the early 1990s released a version of the song that simply skipped the first two words, but kept the tune the same, thus highlighting the simplicity of the lyrics, and the fact that most of its words are of single syllables: "Out to the ball game take me / Out to the crowd buy me / Some peanuts and Cracker Jack, I don't /" etc. Template:Fact
A complete parody of the song was featured in an episode of Freakazoid.
Stories about the song
In 1988, on the 100th anniversary of the poem Casey at the Bat, Sports Illustrated writer Frank Deford constructed a fanciful story (later expanded to book form) which posited Katie Casey as being the daughter of the famous slugger from the poem.
In 2006, Jim Burke (illustrator) authored and illustrated a children's book version of "Take Me Out To The Ballgame."
Online recordings and references