Mystery Mix 2026 Solution

Mystery Mix #6 has come to a conclusion. As such, I can now reveal the solution and announce the winner. Unlike the slow start in last year’s contest, several submissions came in early this time around. Alas, none of those early guesses were correct. I was beginning to wonder if maybe I’d made this year’s puzzle too hard. Actually, that’s always a question. There’s a fine line there—I don’t want it to be so hard that players get discouraged and choose not to participate. On the other hand, I don’t want it so easy as not to be challenging. More about that later.

Given that no correct answers were received before the deadline, I issued a hint, as the rules allow, to those who had previously submitted guesses. That hint was all it took for Bethany Rigney to discern the mystery commonality.

Congratulations to Bethany! Having won the inaugural My Back Pages Mystery Mix six years ago, she is now tied with Dan Browning, who won in 2023 and 2024, as our only repeat winners.

As always, I thank all who took the time to look at this year’s puzzle. And I especially appreciate the several very creative solutions that were offered. I’m glad you had fun with it.

Now for the solution:

Every song in this year’s playlist shares the same unusual characteristic: its lyrics contain no true rhymes—no perfect rhymes, no near rhymes, and no internal rhymes.

Maybe you’ve never really thought about it, but the musical qualities of rhyme are so intrinsic to songwriting that we often take it for granted that a song’s lyrics will rhyme. Well over 99% of all popular songs rely on rhyme in some form—usually end rhyme, where the final word of a line rhymes with the final word of another line, or internal rhyme within the line itself. Without a doubt, strong rhyming schemes give structure to a song’s lyrics and help make it unique and memorably catchy, often delivering a satisfying emotional payoff.

But, I’ve discovered that the absence of rhyme is surprisingly hard to detect. Because we expect rhymes in songs, our brains tend to “hear” patterns that aren’t actually there. In most cases the rhythm is there, even if the rhymes are not. And that brings me to the song that inspired this puzzle.

When this theme occurred to me, the first song I thought of was “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes,” the 1969 hit by Crosby, Stills, and Nash. I spent untold hours in my high school and college years sitting or lying on the floor, in front of a cheap portable record player with detachable plastic speakers, listening to their debut LP (and the 1970 follow-up, Déjà vu), taking in the music, studying the album covers, and reading the lyrics and liner notes. CSN’s music was more than just the background noise typical of Top-40 AM radio of that era. Like with Simon and Garfunkel, I was captivated with their rich vocal harmonies and by the lyric structure and intricate rhyming schemes of their well-crafted songs. On no cut is this more evident than on “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.” The lyrics flow so naturally and feel so melodically correct. Indeed it’s sweet. Oddly, it was many years later before I noticed that this song is virtually without rhyme, only in the third and final section—one end-of-line rhyme and two internal. It’s ironic then that I had to scratch this song from the playlist. It didn’t qualify because of those three unmistakable rhymes at the end.

Okay, you English majors, writers, and poets, I’m aware that repetition—as well as assonance and consonance—are common substitutes songwriters use to create rhythmic structure without relying on true rhyme. While these lyrical building blocks may fit some academic definition of rhyme types, they are admittedly the weakest form of rhyming. I did not consider them when I was selecting songs for this mix, and I eliminated some candidate songs if they contained even one perfect or near rhyme.

For what it’s worth, if you were stumped on this puzzle, there may be some comfort in knowing that ChatGPT couldn’t solve it until I prompted it with the same hint I gave the human participants.

Bethany Rigney, our second repeat winner, holding her trophy mugs.
(photo by Russell Lott, 15 Mar 2026)

A TERM TO PONDER

rhyme(n.): agreement in the terminal sounds of words or metrical lines. Its current spelling is the result of a 16c. attempt to restore a classical spelling to the Middle English rime. It comes to English from Latin rithmus and from Greek rhythmos, meaning rhythm: measured flow or movement, proportion, or symmetry.
etymonline.com

Mercy, I could’ve been a much better speller, if only. And don’t get me started on silent letters!

SONG OF THE DAY

“Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” by Crosby, Stills & Nash (Crosby, Stills & Nash, 1969)

Chestnut-brown canary
Ruby-throated sparrow
Sing a song, don't be long
Thrill me to the marrow

Voices of the angels
Ring around the moonlight
Asking me said she so free
How can you catch the sparrow?