Les Baxter

Born March 14, 1922, at Mexia, Texas. He learned to play the piano at five years of age and studied at the Detroit Conservatory and at Pepperdine College in Los Angeles, California (his uncle was the college's first president).

He began his career as a concert pianist but later joined Mel Tormé's "Meltones" in 1945. Baxter conducted a number of radio shows including "The Bob Hope Show".

But Jimmy Kennedy wrote a new set of lyrics in 1952 for it and it became a huge hit for Baxter\, who also wrote the scores for over 120 motion pictures.

Composed whistling theme for the TV series Lassie (1954).

His recording of "The Poor People of Paris" in March 1956 was a #1 hit and sold more single copies than any other recording during that decade (the song got that title by mistake. Originally titled "The Ballad of Poor John" when it was popularized in France, a Capitol Records representative cabled the title to the US; the cable used the word "gens", meaning "people", instead of "jean"). Another major hit was "April in Portugal", which was based on a song by Raúl Ferrão. It was originally entitled "Coimbra" (after a city in Portugal) and later introduced in the US as the whispering serenade.

Baxter and Ronald Stein were staff composers at American International Pictures for several years, but the two never met, according to Baxter in a 1981 interview. Eight AIP film scores were co-credited to Baxter and Stein.

Interviewed in "It Came from Horrorwood: Interviews with Moviemakers in the SF and Horror Tradition" by Tom Weaver (McFarland, 1996).