5. "Van Lingle Mungo" -- Dave Frishberg
It took inventive songwriting and an encyclopedic knowledge of baseball trivia, but somehow jazzer Dave Frishberg pulled off this clever stunt: using only the names of mostly obscure baseball players from the 1940s as his lyrics, Frishberg constructed a sweet and even touching ode to the sport. Mungo's name serves as a kind of chorus. An often-repeated anecdote has it that Mungo once asked Frishberg whether he might get some royalties for the use of his name in the song. Frishberg"s response was "no" -- but that Mungo was welcome to create his own song titled "Dave Frishberg."
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