Henry Mancini - The Pink Panther Theme

Henry Mancini (April 16, 1924 – June 14, 1994) was an American composer, conductor and arranger, best remembered for his film and television scores. He won a record number of Grammy Awards (20), including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award posthumously in 1995.

His best-known works include the jazz-idiom theme to The Pink Panther film series ("The Pink Panther Theme"), the Peter Gunn Theme from the television series, and back-to-back Academy Awards for the songs "Moon River" from the Blake Edwards film Breakfast at Tiffany's and "Days of Wine and Roses" from the 1962 film Days of Wine and Roses.

Upon discharge, Mancini entered the music industry. In 1946, he became a pianist and arranger for the newly re-formed Glenn Miller Orchestra, led by Tex Beneke.
In 1952, Mancini joined the Universal Pictures music department. During the next six years, he contributed music to over 100 movies, most notably The Creature from the Black Lagoon, It Came from Outer Space, Tarantula, This Island Earth, The Glenn Miller Story (for which he received his first Academy Award nomination), The Benny Goodman Story and Orson Welles' Touch of Evil. Mancini left Universal-International to work as an independent composer/arranger in 1958.

Soon after, he scored the television series Peter Gunn for writer/producer Blake Edwards, the genesis of a relationship which lasted over 35 years and produced nearly 30 films. Together with Alex North, Elmer Bernstein, Leith Stevens and Johnny Mandel, Henry Mancini was one of the pioneers who introduced jazz music into the late romantic orchestral film and TV scores prevalent at the time.
Mancini recorded over 90 albums, in styles ranging from big band to classical to pop. Eight of these albums were certified gold by The Recording Industry Association of America. He had a 20 year contract with RCA Records, resulting in 60 commercial record albums that made him a household name composer of easy listening music.

"The Pink Panther Theme" is an instrumental composition by Henry Mancini written as the theme for the 1963 film The Pink Panther and subsequently nominated for the 1964 Academy Award for Original Music Score. The cartoon character created for the opening credits of the movie by David DePatie and Friz Freleng was animated in time to the tune.The soloist of this song was Plas Johnson.RCA Records released the tune as a single in 1964; it reached the Top 10 on the Billboard adult contemporary chart and won three Grammy Awards.

It was featured in the opening credits of all The Pink Panther films, with the exception of A Shot in the Dark, and Inspector Clouseau.

" The above text is a mashup from Wikipedia."