Eddie Layton, a sports institution in New York as the organist at Yankee Stadium and Madison Square Garden, died Sunday at his home in Forest Hills, Queens.

His death was announced by the Yankees, who said it came after a brief illness. Layton customarily declined to reveal his age, but he was believed to be in his late 70's.

When he was hired in 1967 to play for the Yankees, Layton had never been to Yankee Stadium and knew nothing about baseball.

"I thought that a sacrifice fly had something to do with killing an insect," he recalled in an interview with National Public Radio, shortly after his retirement at the end of the 2003 baseball season. "I didn't know where first base was or third base. But I quickly learned within a week, and I started doing the famous chants, the hand-clapping things, and the dun-dun-dun-dun-da-dun."