Baxter studied piano at the Detroit Conservatory before moving to Los Angeles for further studies at Pepperdine College. Abandoning a concert career as a pianist, he turned to popular music as a singer. At the age of 23 he joined Mel Tormé's Mel-Tones, singing on Artie Shaw records such as "What Is This Thing Called Love?".
Baxter then turned to arranging and conducting for Capitol Records in 1950, and was credited with the early Nat King Cole hits, "Mona Lisa" and "Too Young", but both were actually orchestrated by Nelson Riddle.[1] (In later releases of the recordings the credit was corrected to Riddle.[citation needed]) Not a uncommon practice these days: Baxter himself had arranged Nat King Cole's "Nature Boy" in 1947 for a recording conducted by Frank De Vol. In 1953 he scored his first film, the sailing travelogue Tanga Tika. With his own orchestra, he released a number of hits including "Ruby" (1953), "Unchained Melody" (1955) and "The Poor People Of Paris" (1956). The latter recording sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc.[2]He also achieved success with concept albums of his own orchestral suites: Le Sacre Du Sauvage, Festival Of The Gnomes, Ports Of Pleasure, and Brazil Now, the first three for Capitol and the fourth on Gene Norman's Crescendo label. The list of musicians on these recordings includes Plas Johnson and Clare Fischer.
Baxter also wrote the "Whistle" theme from the TV show Lassie.
Baxter did not restrict his activities to recording. As he once told Soundtrack! magazine, "I never turn anything down".
In the 1960s, he formed the Balladeers, a besuited and conservative folk group that at one time featured a young David Crosby.[citation needed] He operated in radio as musical director of The Halls of Ivy and the Bob Hope and Abbott and Costello shows.
Like his counterparts Henry Mancini, Lalo Schifrin and James Horner, Baxter later worked for the film industries from 1960s to 70s. He worked on movie soundtracks for American International Pictures where he composed and conducted scores for Roger Corman's Edgar Allan Poe films and other horror stories and teenage musicals, including The Pit and the Pendulum, Panic in Year Zero!, Beach Party, The Comedy of Terrors,The Dunwich Horror, and Frogs. Howard W. Koch recalled that Baxter composed, orchestrated, and recorded the entire score of The Yellow Tomahawk (1954) in a total of three hours for $5,000.[3]
With less soundtrack work in the 1980s, he scored music for theme parks and SeaWorlds. In the 1990s, Baxter was widely celebrated, alongside Martin Denny and the Arthur Lyman Group, as one of the progenitors of what had become known as the "exotica" movement. In his 1996 appreciation for Wired magazine, writer David Toop remembered Baxter thus:
"Baxter offered package tours in sound, selling tickets to sedentary tourists who wanted to stroll around some taboo emotions before lunch, view a pagan ceremony, go wild in the sun or conjure a demon, all without leaving home hi-fi comforts in the white suburbs".
Baxter has a motion picture star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6314 Hollywood Blvd.
I Love Paris
Les Baxter and His Orchestra Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
And all my daydreams have gone astray
I think about the one and only
Who's bound to find me some golden day
The one I love is coming along some day
And I'll have none except the one I love
He/She may be near or ever so far away
And though our meeting is left to chance
Until our meeting
I still will have my dream romance
And through the night I pray to the moon above
To please be kind and find the one I love
In the opening lines of the song "I Love Paris," Les Baxter with his Orchestra & Chorus speaks to the singer's loneliness and unfulfilled daydreams. The singer pines for a lover, a significant other, who he/she hopes will find him or her on some glorious day. The verses of the song are filled with melancholy, with the singer dreaming of the day their significant other will come to them. The refrain of the song is where the true heart of the singer's feelings can be seen. The singer declares that they will have none other than the one they love. This person, the one, may yet be close or far away, but the singer is steadfast in their declaration that only this one is held high in their affections.
The chorus of "I Love Paris" brings the song together with its dreams of romance. The singer of the story understands that finding the one they love is left to chance, and until that time, they indulge in dream romance. Through the night, the singer prays to the moon above to help them find the one they love. As the song finishes up, though, the melancholy tune is removed and replaced with a bouncy, optimistic tune. The song then takes on a joyous and entertaining feel.
Line by Line Meaning
When days are long and nights are lonely
During the times when the days seem never-ending and the nights are spent in isolation
And all my daydreams have gone astray
When all of my hopes and aspirations seem to have disintegrated
I think about the one and only
I contemplate the one and only person who holds a special place in my heart
Who's bound to find me some golden day
This person is bound to help me find happiness in life in the future
The one I love is coming along some day
The person I love will eventually make their way into my life at some point
And I'll have none except the one I love
I will not settle for anyone else but the person I truly love
He/She may be near or ever so far away
The person I love could be close by or they could be far away
But I'll have none except the one I love
However, I will not choose someone else, I will wait for the one I love
And though our meeting is left to chance
Although the possibility of us meeting is left up to fate
Until our meeting
Until the time we have the chance to meet each other
I still will have my dream romance
I will continue to imagine and hope for a romantic future with the person I love
And through the night I pray to the moon above
At every nightfall, I turn towards the moon and pray for my heartfelt wishes to come true
To please be kind and find the one I love
I beseech the moon to play a hand in bringing the one I love into my life
Lyrics © Royalty Network, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Written by: Bronislaw Kaper, Gus Kahn, Walter Jurmann
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
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